


We Live This Close To Death

by solinear (vilse)



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Developing Relationship, F/M, Slow Burn, Somebody Lives/Not Everyone Dies
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-11
Updated: 2018-02-19
Packaged: 2018-09-23 15:09:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 27,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9662906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vilse/pseuds/solinear
Summary: Nema left Jedha to become a mechanic for the Rebel Alliance. She didn't think that she'd ever come back, and she didn't think that her small, feverish crush on Cassian Andor would get tangled up with saving the rebellion.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Some notes on details:  
> I've tried to find out what kind of ranks are used in the Rebel Alliance, but the facts are inconsistent and ambiguous – if Luke is a commander in ESB, what is he a commander of? If Han is a general, how did he get there? I have thus decided that mechanics on Yavin 4 have the same ranks as the rest of the rebellion, i. e. whatever sounds good.
> 
> Title is from The Decemberists' "Here I Dreamt I Was an Architect."

“Don’t you ever just want to fly one of the ships you’re working on?”

Arro was watching her from the other side of the canteen table, and Nema didn’t look up from her tasteless, grey stew as she replied.

“Don’t you ever just want to be able to fix a laser cannon before it malfunctions?”

Arro raised an eyebrow, waving his fork in her general direction.

“You don’t appreciate me enough, Ress. If you’re not careful I’ll just sit with someone else at lunch.”

Nema snorted, but instantly regretted it as a piece of her stew of unknown origin (it had the texture of old rubber) lodged itself in her throat and she had to cough a few times to dislodge it. “You’d never”, she said at last, between coughs, although her comeback was lost in Arro’s laughter at her food-related misfortune.

“I bet you’d be sorry if I choked and died”, she muttered, and Arro smiled.

“Yeah, you’re right, lunch time wouldn’t be half as fun without you.”

The canteen was almost empty by now, so calling it ‘lunch time’ was generous – it was more like ‘for once we get to eat our lukewarm stew before sundown’-time. Nema didn’t complain, and neither did Arro. Between her work shifts and his sniper training between missions, getting to share a meal was a rare occasion. Nema could count the times she’d had lunch before dark since their relocation to Yavin 4 on one hand.

“Do you think the droids will have updated the new target computers by the time I get back?” Nema asked Arro as they collected their plates and left the table, and it was Arro’s time to snort.

“You wish. I don’t think those droids realize that their own software is older than you are”, he said, readjusting the shoulder strap of his uniform as they walked into the vast hangar. “Hey, that reminds me, I think Cassian is around here somewhere today.”

The smirk on Arro’s face was not lost on her.

“I know, I told Thel to check out the s-foils on his ship.” Nema tried to keep her voice level.

“Oh, I thought you’d want to check out his _ship_ yourself.”

Nema rolled her eyes. “Will you stop it?”

“Hey, I’m not the one who’s crushing hard on Andor."

“Shut it, Basteren.”

Nema was used to Arro’s remarks – after all, he’d been one of her best friends on the base since day one, when she’d been a scared-to-death fifteen-year-old who had just left her home planet, and he’d been a Pathfinder recruit with kind eyes who knew what it was like to leave everything behind. She still didn’t appreciate him talking about her unfortunate fascination with a certain rebel intelligence officer, especially not when there were people around. She was trying to forget about the existence of Cassian Andor every time he wasn’t on base, and Arro reminding her of that existence didn’t help one bit. She told him as much, and Arro just laughed again, although with less mirth than before.

“Is that working out well for you?” he asked, and Nema was just about to shoot back that it was working out _just fine,_ when someone called her name from the landing pad they were approaching.

“Oh, look who it is,” Arro said before turning away towards his squad, who were loitering just a few landing pads over, getting ready for another bout of target practice. “I’ll see you later, Ress. Don’t stay up all night.”

Nema resisted the urge to stick out her tongue at Arro’s retreating figure, and she succeeded mostly because Cassian Andor was watching her. She tried her best not to stumble while walking over.

“Hey, Captain”, she said. “I thought Thel was checking up on your ship this time.” She really tried to shut out Arro’s reference to _checking things on Andor’s ship,_ but failed miserably.

Cassian was leaning against one of the crates stacked up against the temple wall behind them.

“You’re still not calling me Cassian?” he asked, his Festian accent sending an unwanted rush of emotions through her. He even smiled at her, and she thought that the last mission must have gone well. No casualties. She didn’t see that smile very often. “How long have we known each other, Sergeant?”

“Three years. And you’re still not calling me by my first name either, _Cassian”,_ Nema replied, and she bit her cheek to keep at least some of her emotions in check. “Are you just hanging around my landing pad because you missed me?”

 _Stop flirting._ She wanted to kick herself. It was always like this when he was around (which wasn’t that often).

Cassian smiled again. She couldn’t tell what it meant. “Yes, that, and I needed you to look at the s-foils. Thel’s good, but you know…” he shrugged. “You know my ship better.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She grabbed her toolkit from on top of one of the crates, and told one of the more reliable maintenance droids – a wobbly R4-unit who had definitely seen better days – to come along while silently telling herself that this didn’t mean anything. It was an undeniable truth that she knew the U-wing assigned to Cassian better than Thel, the recruit, did.

Since being promoted to sergeant four months ago, Nema had had the luxury of not having to share the maintenance droids with the other mechanics. Instead, she had her own droid squad, although most of them were in dire need of reprogramming. They kept making mistakes that she needed to check for and fix before they could do any real damage. The mechanic squad, on the other hand, were mostly competent. Unfortunately, someone in charge had decided to put almost every new recruit on her squad, which made everyday life a bit harder than it had to be. At least she had a fancy new patch on her uniform, and shiny new goggles (which had of course stayed shiny for about five seconds after reaching the hangar). The goggles were all but fused to her forehead when they weren’t covering her eyes.

They walked to the U-wing in silence for a good thirty seconds before Nema felt too awkward not to say anything. That always happened with Cassian for some reason.

"So… did you just get back?”

Classic. Ask him something obvious. _That'll make you seem intelligent._

“Yes,” said Cassian next to her, and if he had any opinion on her lack of intelligence, he didn’t show it. That syllable was however his only reply, and Nema realized that the mission might not have gone as well as she’d initially thought.

Cassian rarely talked about his missions - mostly because they were classified, which meant that Nema didn’t have the clearance (the shiny patch did nothing for her there). But sometimes, Nema knew that it was just something else stopping him. Like now. And she tried to tell herself that it didn’t matter that he didn’t want to talk about it with her, because she did _not_ have a crush on him. Three years of professional friendship, of which she’d spent at least two definitely _not_ having a crush, did not mean that he wanted to tell her about his feelings. Feelings were reserved for people on the ground, like her, who never had to make split-second decisions that could potentially kill people.

That’s why it surprised her when Cassian started again after a few seconds of silence, when they were almost at Thel’s landing pad.

“It was a bad one.”

Nema looked at him as they continued to walk, but slowed down. She didn’t know what to say, exactly, but the smile he’d had for her before was gone now, replaced by the face she was more used to seeing. The one he always had when he got back from the missions that were obviously bad - the ones where entire squadrons were lost, or when she’d hear rumours of entire villages wiped out by the Empire after Cassian had just gotten back from that particular planet. But this time, that expression was directed at her.

“I’m sorry,” was all she could muster.

She wanted to ask him if he was alright, but knew that it wouldn’t really make a difference. He obviously wasn’t.

They had stopped in front of his ship, and she could hear K-2 arguing with Thel from inside about which cables were supposed to be connected to the hyperdrive. K-2 was right, but Thel was persistent, and Nema knew that she was probably going to have to break them up sooner or later. Cassian must have realized the same thing, because the haunted look was replaced by his usual, neutral one, and he turned away from her.

“Hey”, she said, and couldn’t stop herself from putting her hand on his arm. _Dammit._ And she didn’t have anything to say, either. Instead, she squeezed his arm lightly through the fabric of his jacket, and thought for a split second that she hadn’t touched him before. It was strange that she could know someone that well and not touch them. His eyes were fixed on her, like he was waiting for something, and it felt like the longest moment of eye contact in her life. Cassian seemed to understand something of what she was trying to convey, because he gave her a small nod and a half-smile before breaking that eye contact.

She let go of his arm and tried to find her bearings again.

Mechanic. S-foils. Try to keep K-2 from killing Thel.

It was all business as usual by the time Nema had hoisted herself up on the U-wing’s hull to look at the right s-foil. Cassian had went inside the ship, possibly to scold the droid, and she took a deep breath before gripping her Harris wrench tightly and getting to work.

-

She was replaying the conversation with Cassian in her head for the rest of the day, and she was still thinking about it when her shift ended. It was dark by then, and the tropical heat of Yavin 4 had cooled down. Nothing ever seemed to be completely dry here, though. Nema made her way to the public refreshers that were closest to her sleeping quarters as soon as she had taken off her utility belt. The rebellion was all about solidarity, which meant that not even General Draven had his own refresher. It also meant that a promotion to sergeant as a mechanic in the F sector didn’t get her so much as a fresh towel, and when Nema stepped out of her sweaty uniform, there were two other women in the changing room. Nema said hello but was too exhausted to make conversation. She just wanted mostly fresh, (probably not) warm water and soap, not interaction.

Cassian had smiled at her when she first saw him today. She couldn’t keep the feeling of absolute dread and happiness from her gut as she thought about that. But with Cassian, she always had mixed feelings - for Arro, on the other hand, it seemed simple.

“Just crush and get it over with”, he’d told her once over a couple of beers (or five). “It’s not worth it if you won't do something about it. Live in the moment.”

But how could she live in the moment when it came to Cassian? This rebellion was no place for romance, because even though she had only ever fired her blaster at target practice, the war was shaping everything around her. She still remembered the face of every pilot whose ship she’d worked on who’d never returned to base. Pilots who were just like Cassian - fighters who would do anything for this rebellion. And her feelings, even if they for some remote reason were reciprocated, didn’t fit into that world. She was just a mechanic. A lowly, rebel mechanic who hadn’t set foot on half as many planets as Cassian had. Before coming to Yavin 4 with the rest of the rebel crew, Nema had been on exactly two other planets: Jedha, where she had learned everything about every engine she came in contact with, and Dantooine, where she had tried to learn everything about the ships in the rebel fleet as fast as she possibly could.

The water in the refresher was, as she had expected, not even bordering on hot. It didn’t have to be, most of the time – on this planet, all you wanted to do was cool off. But she felt like she needed that hot water today, to think of anything but Cassian. Her four minutes of refresher time were up sooner than she’d liked, and she started to sweat again before she had even dried off.

There was one, tiny mirror in her sleeping quarters. Shara, the only pilot in the eight-person dorm, had put it up next to the storage lockers. Nema didn’t use it that often. She knew what she looked like, and it wasn’t like her droids or Arro or any of the people in the resistance would care if her hair was messy. Most people around here only cared about function. Did she do her job? Great, then nothing else mattered. It was only when Cassian was around that she had made a habit out of at least checking to see if she had suddenly gone bald, or if she had mysteriously grown a second nose overnight. If Arro knew what kind of behavior Cassian brought out in her she would never hear the end of it.

Looking into that mirror now, Nema saw her own, tired face and her still damp hair sticking to her forehead. It wasn’t a second nose, but she was surprised at how tired she looked. Since the promotion she had slept even less than before. There was always a droid that was malfunctioning or a recruit who had misconnected wires - things that she needed to fix on top of the usual check-ups and repairs. And there were the added meetings and briefings, all of which was new to her.

_I look like my mother._

She shook her head at her own reflection and turned away from the mirror. Her mother wasn’t here. Back on Jedha, her mother had told her that if she didn’t make her life count for something, what was she good for?

Fifteen-year-old Nema had thought about that the whole trip from Jedha to Dantooine, sandwiched between rebels and crates on the undercover freighter she had hitched a ride on. Twenty-year-old Nema didn’t let it get to her anymore. If her mother hadn’t pushed her to get off that dead-end planet, Nema would still be fixing airspeeders on Jedha.

She knew what her mother had wanted. _Get off this planet. Don’t end up like me._ And Nema had tried her best not to.

Shara Bey turned up in the doorway just as Nema had put on her uniform jumpsuit again. At least she had a clean shirt now, even if all of her shirts looked the same. 

“Hey, I thought I’d find you here.” Shara was smiling, and was still in her flight suit from that day’s surveillance mission. “There’s a bunch of us having drinks down by sector H. Are you coming?”

“Only if you have those beers you owe me from last time.” Nema tied the arms of the jumpsuit around her waist as she spoke. Shara grinned, holding up a crate of four pristine bottles of Jawa beer – or at least they were as pristine as those bottles could get.

“Don’t ask me where I got them. Just drink,” Shara advised as they were walking down the corridors towards the hangar. Nema laughed at this and weighed one of the bottles in her hand. She didn’t usually get drunk. None of them did, really, since they were constantly on duty in case something happened. But tonight, getting at least a tiny bit drunk didn’t seem like such a bad idea. Of course, they weren’t really supposed to drink on base, but Nema doubted that any of them would get past the tipsy stage tonight. She was already exhausted from her twelve-hour shift.

Shara disappeared as soon as they joined the small party of base personnel gathered in the north end of the hangar, and Nema saw her join Kes Dameron over by the pilots across the crowd. Nema's recruit squad were hanging out a few landing pads over, but Nema didn’t feel like joining them – they were all basically the same age, but the shiny patch had changed something in their dynamic. If she went over there, they would all probably tense up and stop drinking.

There were people talking and even laughing everywhere. Nema stood there holding her beer for a few moments wondering if she’d be better off going back to bed, when Arro slung his arm around her shoulders and told her to stop her sulking. He was in his civilian clothes for once, and he was smiling.

“I’m not sulking”, she shot back, but realized as she said it that by saying just that, she was by definition sulking. “I’m just not drunk yet.”

“Well, finish that beer then, I’ve got some Kowakian rum you should try.”

Nema quirked an eyebrow.

“I think I’ll stick with beer, thanks.”

Arro shrugged, letting go of her shoulder. “Suit yourself. But that rum is worth it. You might even get the courage to make a move on Cassian.”

Nema hoped that the look she shot Arro would be enough to make him shut up for the rest of the night, and he must have sensed her discomfort because he suddenly seemed apologetic.

“Hey, I’m sorry that I keep bringing that up. But you know –”

“I know.”

They had had the conversation about living in the moment enough times for Nema to know exactly where he was headed with that tone of voice, and Arro dropped the subject. Instead, he reached into his pocket and handed her his pocket-flask. It was his good-luck flask, the one he always brought on missions but never drank from. Nema had always assumed that it was empty. It had his initials carved to the bottom, and Nema knew that it was one of the few items he had taken with him from his home on Ertegas.

“Have some,” he said. “You need a pick-me-up, and my rogue charm doesn’t seem to be helping.”

He grinned at the last part, and Nema resisted the urge to roll her eyes. She did love this person, even though he got on her nerves at least once a week. If he wasn’t on some secret mission with his Pathfinder squad, he was here on base with his endless teasing, and Nema didn’t know what to do without him.

The content of his flask was, as she had suspected, Kowakian rum. It was strong enough to make her head spin for a second with just one swig, and Arro laughed at her disgusted expression. It did make her feel a bit better, though. A tiny bit of her weariness turned into a comfortable state of oblivion.

Luckily for Arro, he didn’t say anything else about Cassian. Instead, he led her over to where a few members of his squad were playing cards. Nema knew most of them – there was Yosh, who always carried his explosives around, and Eskro, who had overseen Nema’s basic combat training when Arro had been away on that three-month mission last year. When Arro had learned that she didn’t even know how to shoot a blaster, he had insisted that she at least learn the basics. “Just ‘cause you’re a mechanic doesn’t mean that you won’t need to fight”, he had said. They nodded to Nema when they saw her, but then went back to their game of sabacc.

To her surprise, but probably not to Arro’s, Cassian was standing to the side of the group, next to a few crates filled with scrap metal parts, talking to one of the officers in a low voice. Neither seemed to be in a very festive mood despite everything that was going on around them – Cassian had a slight frown on his face as he listened to what the officer said.

Nema didn’t know if it was the rum or just sheer stupidity, but she found it very hard to look away from him. The officer walked away and Cassian looked up, suddenly looking straight at her. Brown, warm eyes. The frown was replaced by another smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes, but at least it was a smile. Nema defied the part of her instincts that told her to walk in the other direction and listened to the part that just wanted to be close to Cassian Andor. She crossed the concrete and handed him one of Shara’s bottles of beer.

“You look like you need this more than I do.”

Cassian’s fingers grazed hers as she handed over the bottle. 

“Jawa? This is some quality beer”, Cassian commented, and she thought that that smile was almost genuine now. “I haven’t had one in forever.”

He opened it, and they clinked their bottles together in some sort of pathetic toast. What were they toasting for? Right now, it seemed like they were the only ones not celebrating something.

“To getting that s-coil fixed?” she suggested, and Cassian actually chuckled.

“To getting that s-coiled fixed,” he replied. And then he looked at her for a moment before saying: “Do you want to stay, or can we get out of here for a moment?”

 

-

 

By the time Cassian sat down on the concrete and leaned against the crates on the U-wing’s landing pad, Nema had convinced herself that it was some sort of mechanical problem that Cassian wanted her help with. It made sense – after all, she was a mechanic who was constantly on call. She had just hoped that he had wanted to hang out with her despite that.

It didn’t really seem like it was a mechanical emergency, though, and Nema sat down next to him on the ground. Closer than she would have, had they been around people, but further away than she really wanted. Cassian looked up at the ship in front of them, and Nema looked at Cassian. Despite the fact that he was exhausted, he was as handsome as when she’d realized (although she had spent a lot of time trying to un-realize it) that the only thing standing between her and kissing him was her self-preservation. That, and the fact that he probably wouldn’t kiss her back.

“What’s up?” she said, trying to sound at least a bit casual while sliding down to the concrete next to him. Her jumpsuit were already covered in engine grease and hangar dust. Sitting on the floor wouldn’t change anything.

Cassian took another swig from his bottle, and Nema thought that he was avoiding the question.

"I’m flying out again tomorrow.”

Nema nodded slowly. It wasn’t unusual for Cassian to jump from one mission to the next. Even spending twenty-four hours on base was rare for him.

“Another mission?”

“Yes.”

“Did you want me to check something on the ship before that?”

Cassian glanced at her with an almost amused expression, a small smile on his lips.

“No,” he started, “I just wanted to talk to you before I went out again.” He looked away again, focusing on the U-wing’s landing gear or something beyond that which Nema couldn’t see. "You know we're friends, right?"

Nema quirked an eyebrow. "Of course I know that. Even though you keep calling me 'Ress'."

"I'll try to stop." He was still smiling, but was suddenly serious again. "What do you remember from Jedha?"

The question was so unexpected that Nema had to think for a moment. 

“Most of it. But I haven’t been back there in years. It was crawling with bucketheads before I left.”

There was a short pause. Nema took a swig of her beer, trying to figure out where he was going with this. They didn't talk about their homeworlds often at all. There was so much more to do around here than thinking about planets you were never going back to.

“Nema.” She wondered if she’d ever heard him say her name like that. Not called out to get her attention or in passing, but like she actually meant something. Cassian took a deep breath before continuing. “The mission I got back from… I found out something about the Empire. They’re building a weapon.”

He was still looking away from her, which made what he was saying all the more striking. The way he said it made the hairs on her neck stand on end, and he turned his gaze to hers.

“What kind of weapon?”

Her voice was way more quiet than she had intended.

“I was told it’s a planet killer.”

He wasn’t supposed to tell her this. She knew that he was breaking rules, and whatever rules he broke in the line of duty, those were rules that he had to break for the cause. But both she and Cassian knew what kind of power information held. As an intelligence officer, he was probably trained to keep things like this a secret, although Nema had never asked what kind of training could teach a person that.

And yet here he was, telling her something which was probably classified on a level way above her station. And it hit her then exactly what it was that he was saying, and why he had this look on his face that she had never seen before. Cassian was scared.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because I need you to know, in case –” He sighed. “I can’t tell you if it’s a weapon that already exists or if it’s operational, but if anything happens… I need you to get out. Just run. Just take any ship and get out of there.”

There was an urgency to his voice that she hadn’t heard before. The weight of his words made her heart sink and soar at the same time.

He did care about her.

But if this weapon did exist, it was unlikely that she would ever get the chance to tell him how much he really meant to her. She wasn’t sure that she would ever want to do that, but she would at least like to have the possibility.

“I will”, she replied at last, trying to sound as convincing as the could.

Cassian nodded, keeping his gaze locked with hers for another second before looking away again. She could almost feel the tension breaking, and the conversation changed direction.

“Do you want to go back to the party?”

There was a touch of a suggestion there, and Nema latched on to it.

“No.” She reached into the deep leg pocket of her pants and pulled out the last bottle of Jawa beer. “Want to share?"

This time, Cassian’s smile was definitely real.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Obviously, anything you recognize is not mine, including the bits of movie script in the upcoming chapters.

Jyn Erso was brought to the base early the next morning, when Nema had just finished patching up the latest of the R4-units to break down. She was stationed by the entrance to the hangar, trying to rid the droid of some of the more visible stains of hangar dust and oil, when the ship landed and then made its way into the hangar. She saw Melshi get off with his squadron. K-2 was with them, as well – Nema had seen him leave yesterday, for once without Cassian. 

A dark-haired woman was led off the ship last, in handcuffs and accompanied by a guard.

Nema stopped her work with the cloth, which was already too dirty to do any real cleaning, and watched for a second as the group disappeared from view. She didn’t have any time to think about it, however, since the speaker system crackled for a short moment before there was an announcement.

“ _Sergeant Ress to the briefing room. Sergeant Ress to the briefing room._ ”

Nema frowned, and the droid in front of her uttered a series of concerned beeps.

“I don’t know, I don’t _think_ I’ve done anything”, she answered it.

The hangar was bustling with activity, as it usually was at this time, and it took her longer than she would have liked to cross it. Thel caught up with her and walked behind her the whole way, asking questions about his tasks for the day and what ships were coming in and whether or not she had seen the new astromech droids.

“Thel, I really don’t have the time. And you need to check up on Captain Andor’s ship.”

“Again?”

“Yes, again. Go. Do it.”

The recruit muttered as he walked off, and Nema had to remind herself that he was only sixteen. Just like she had been – sixteen years old and used to doing things her own way.

The air in the briefing room was cooler than in the hangar. It was the first thing Nema noticed. She hadn’t been in here more than three times since coming to Yavin 4. The second thing she noticed was the woman from earlier, sitting at the other end of the central holograph screen in the far end of the room, illuminated by the bluish glow from the screens beside her. General Draven, standing on the other side with his back to Nema, next to the senator. And then Cassian. He looked so different from the last time she’d seen him, mere hours ago as the sun had started to rise beyond the trees they were facing. She had woken up with her head on his shoulder without remembering falling asleep, and he had been asleep as well, probably in an uncomfortable position with his head resting on hers.

She had never been that close to him before. He had smiled when he’d helped her to her feet, later, before they had gone their separate ways to get some real sleep in actual beds.

He wasn’t smiling now.

“We're up against the clock here, girl, so if there's nothing to talk about, we'll just put you back where we found you.”

General Draven’s voice was threatening, and from where Nema was standing, she could see the determined look on the young woman’s face shift to hesitant.

“I was a child. Saw Gerrera saved my life. He raised me. But I've no idea where he is. I haven't seen him in years.”

Saw Gerrera. Nema recognized that name; it was the name of the rebel extremist operating on Jedha, causing trouble the rebellion didn’t need. Part of her was glad that there at least was _some_ kind of rebel activity on that planet. If this woman had been raised by Saw Gerrera, she must be one hell of a fighter. That didn’t explain why Nema had been called here, though. She she didn’t belong with these people – Nema noticed former senator Bail Organa watching the scene just in front of her. She suddenly felt like she was sixteen again, called in to see her superior after an unfortunate astromech had caused an engine fire on her shift.

“We know how to find him, that's not our problem.” Cassian spoke in a way that she’d never heard before. There was a threatening edge to his voice as well, although not as blatant as with Draven. “What we need is someone who gets us through the door without being killed.”

The woman seemed confused. “You're all rebels, aren't you?”

“Yes, but Saw Gerrera's an extremist.” Senator Mothma’s voice was much calmer than the others'. She had always been a peripheral being in Nema’s world – someone whose presence always quieted a room, but who was never concerned with the everyday things in Nema’s life. “He's been fighting on his own since he broke with the Rebellion.”

Nema looked at Cassian, wondering again why she had been brought here. No one seemed to have noticed her yet, but she must have been called here for a reason. Otherwise she was just listening in on a conversation she wasn’t supposed to hear.

“What does this have to do with my father?”

Just as Cassian replied that there was an Imperial defector in Jedha being held by Saw Gerrera, general Draven noticed her. She had never had much contact with the general. Not in person, anyway, since she had other superiors who in turn got their orders from Draven. Now, Draven gave her a once-over which she couldn’t interpret, and nodded before turning his attention back to the conversation. It was obvious that he was the one who had called her here, and she was starting to figure out why.

But that couldn’t be it, could it?

“We need to stop this weapon before it is finished.” _The weapon._ Cassian’s words from last night. The planet killer. “Captain Andor's mission is to authenticate the pilot's story and then, if possible, find your father.”

Another mission. It was a dangerous one, for sure, but Cassian’s missions were always dangerous. It occurred to Nema that she had never actually gotten this much information about Cassian’s missions before. Senator Mothma continued: “It appears he is critical to the development of this superweapon. Given the gravity of the situation and your history with Saw, we're hoping that he will help us locate your father and return him to the Senate for testimony.”

“And if I do it?” The woman was still defiant, but Nema had a feeling that she didn’t really have a choice. Senator Mothma looked at her, and Nema knew that she wouldn’t have been as sure of herself as the woman seemed to be in that situation.

“We'll make sure you go free.”

The woman thought for a second before nodding, agreeing. “I’ll do it.”

“Good. You’ll be leaving with Captain Andor within the hour.”

“Captain Andor”, Draven said as the stillness of the room was suddenly broken, and the people involved in the conversation started going about their business again. He motioned for Nema to come closer, and Cassian noticed her at last. He looked at her with slight confusion before his face returned to its usual state, jaw set, and Nema hesitantly walked over to stand in front of the General. Cassian’s gaze followed her, and she noticed that the woman was watching her as well. “I trust that you’ve met Sergeant Ress?”

“Yes”, Cassian replied. Nema knew then, and Cassian obviously knew as well.

“I was looking through your personnel file, Sergeant, and I noticed that you grew up on Jedha. You know your way around there.”

Nema hesitated, and didn’t dare look at Cassian. “I haven’t been back there in five years, sir.”

Draven waved a hand at her again, disregarding her objection. “I’m sure it hasn’t changed that much, and the way things are, you are the only one on base with intimate knowledge of the Holy City. You’ve received combat training from private Basteren, as well?”

“Yes, sir, but…”

“I want you to accompany Captain Andor and Jyn Erso to Jedha.”

The silence was deafening. At least to Nema, who suddenly couldn’t find her voice. It had disappeared somewhere with Draven’s words, and even though it only lasted a couple of seconds, she felt like her whole world was swallowed up and then spat back out.

“General.” Cassian didn’t look at her, which made things worse. “ _I_ know Jedha. You can’t expect…”

“I don’t see why not, Captain. Apparently, she knows your ship as well. You need as much intel on Jedha as you can get. Make sure she gets a blaster.”

 

-

 

She didn’t know how she found her way to her quarters, nor how she had the presence of mind to pack. Jedha was a cold moon, and she had to dig through the bottom of her alliance-administered metal trunk to find what she was looking for. The jacket she had worn from Jedha to Dantooine, but not a single time after that, was not big on her anymore but almost a perfect fit. The thin, woolen scarf which her mother had given her on her fourteenth birthday still had stains from that time when she scraped her chin. The few things she needed fit into her backpack, and she changed out of her uniform into civilian clothes.

She had to go by the armory. The droid in charge wanted to see her clearance badge three times before handing over an old but functioning blaster, and she strapped the holster to her leg like Arro had shown her a million times. She tried not to think about the fact that she was wearing it to be able to shoot people this time, not just target practice on cardboard stormtroopers.

Arro crossed her mind for a second, but she realized that he had gone out on trooper training in the swamps to the north at dawn. He wouldn’t realize she was gone until late, or perhaps not even until tomorrow.

K-2 was the only one waiting by the U-wing when she got there.

“Sergeant Ress”, he greeted her as she climbed on board. “Cassian doesn’t like this.”

“That much is obvious”, Nema muttered, placing her backpack on the steel floor. “Did Thel double-check the shield generator?”

K-2 looked at her with as much contempt as a droid could muster. “I don’t think Thel knows where the shield generator _is.”_

Nema rolled her eyes. “Did he check it or not?”

“He was up there with his wrench, if that’s what you’re asking.”

It hit Nema that Thel probably wasn’t her responsibility anymore – some of the other senior mechanics would probably be taking over, or one of the juniors would be promoted. She would be flown off the planet and into a war zone, and her returning to Yavin 4 was not very probable.

Did Cassian feel this way every time he got a new mission?

The woman from earlier appeared by the open hatch just as Nema was contemplating whether or not to climb up to the shield generator, just to be sure. She looked at Nema for a second before turning to K-2, eyeing him with suspicion.

“I'm K-2SO. I'm a reprogrammed Imperial droid,” he said, noticing her stare.

“I remember you”, the woman replied coldly before turning to Nema again, and Nema guessed that since K-2 had brought this woman to the base, it hadn’t been a very pleasant encounter. “You’re the one from Jedha.”

“Nema Ress,” Nema replied, and wondered if the woman was trying to figure out her as much as it was the other way around. “You’re…”

“Trouble,” came K-2’s voice from the co-pilot seat.

“Kay.” Nema used the voice she usually reserved for when her astromechs misbehaved, and K-2 shot her an unreadable look.

“The council is sending both of you with us to Jedha”, K-2 continued like nothing had happened. “That is a bad idea. I think so, and so does Cassian.” When Nema was about to protest again, he said: “What do I know? My specialty is just strategic analysis.”

“Don’t mind him, he tends to say whatever comes into his circuits”, Nema told the woman. “Cassian says it’s a by-product of the reprogram.”

Nema could see Cassian across the landing pad, talking to Draven. The woman looked in the same direction.

“I’m Jyn,” she said. She nodded towards Draven and Cassian. “Nothing like being surrounded by people people who just want to use you."

“Something like that”, Nema replied, watching Cassian as he turned and walked towards them. This day was not turning out like she had thought it would, and she wondered for a moment why it felt like the Cassian in front of her was a different person than the one whose shoulder she had fallen asleep on last night. He still barely looked at her except to give her a curt nod as he entered the ship.

“Why do both of them get blasters, and I don’t?”

K-2’s question made Cassian turn his gaze to Jyn. “What?”

“I know how to use it”, Jyn protested.

“That’s what I’m afraid of. Give it to me.”

Nema frowned, feeling like she had missed something. Sure, Jyn came here in handcuffs, but if they were going to Jedha –

“We’re going into a war zone”, Nema said before she could stop herself. Cassian turned to her, and really looked at her for the first time.

“That’s not the point.” His voice was hard. He turned to Jyn again. “Where did you get it?”

“I found it.”

Even Jyn could hear the deception in Jyn’s voice, and of course K-2 did as well.

“I find that answer vague and unconvincing.”

Cassian looked at Jyn, and Jyn stared right back. Nema already liked her despite her tendency to steal blasters. If Cassian wasn’t going to trust either of them, at least it was nice to have someone on her side.

“Trust goes both ways”, Jyn said at last, and threw Nema a glance as Cassian didn’t do anything to attempt to take the blaster from her. As they heard K-2’s protests from the front (“You're letting her keep it? Would you like to know the probability of her using it against you?”), Jyn looked at Nema and said:

“So, how did you get into trouble with the captain?”

Nema didn't know what to say. As she heard the familiar sound of the engines and felt the not-so-familiar tug of the ship leaving the ground, she tried not to look at the back of Cassian’s head as he steered the ship upwards. She was pretty sure Jyn was watching her as she failed in her attempts, and she tried to keep her face neutral.

She looked out the window. The landing pads, the old temple, the green of the jungle surrounding it – it all got smaller and smaller until it disappeared completely, and then, they were surrounded by the star-specked darkness of space.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jedha is cold, and nothing goes as planned.

Jyn managed to fall asleep once they entered hyperspace. Nema supposed getting kidnapped by the Rebellion and then sent on a suicide mission did that to a person. Jyn slept with one hand on her blaster. Maybe she was worried that Cassian would steal it back while she slept.

Nema, on the other hand, couldn’t sleep. Not that she was actually trying – despite only getting a couple of hours of sleep in her own bed, and before that a couple more on the concrete by Cassian’s side, she was wide awake. Cassian still didn’t look at her, even though there wasn’t much he could do control-wise as long as they were in hyperspace. The nav computer did all the work with K-2 keeping watch. Nema fiddled with her backpack, double-checked everything – which was pointless, what would she do if she had forgotten something, ask to go back? – for a good fifteen minutes before she couldn’t take it anymore. Since nobody had bothered to brief her on anything more than “you’re going to Jedha to find Saw Gerrera”, she thought that she’d start there.

“So what are we looking for on Jedha?”

Cassian kept his eyes on the controls, though even Nema could see that he didn’t have to. The flickering lights of hyperspace illuminated everything in a blue-white glow, and K-2 looked to Cassian, then to her, and then back to Cassian. He didn’t say anything, though, for which Nema was grateful. Silence from K-2 was a blessed occurrence.

“The Imperial defector is being held by Saw Gerrera. We need to find him and authenticate his story.”

Cassian’s voice was still cold; just repeating facts, not looking at her. If Nema had to guess, she would say that even K-2 picked up on the tension between them.

“Right.” When Cassian didn’t say anything more, Nema added: “Just because you’ve only ever seen me fixing engines and droids doesn’t mean that I’m useless in a fight, you know.”

If K-2 could have coughed, he would have – instead, he gave an insinuating “hmph” as Cassian stopped whatever meaningless check-up he was doing with the controls for a second.

“I know that.”

“Good.”

She wanted to smile, to assure him that everything was fine - she still knew what it felt like to have him smile at her, to have the fabric of his corellian jacket pressed to her cheek as she listened to his breathing as he slept. But the look on his face made it impossible to smile. His brown eyes found hers, and for a moment, she thought that he was going to say something… important.

“We’ll reach Jedha in three hours. You should get some sleep.”

 _So should you,_ Nema wanted to say. She didn’t.

She did manage to catch at least an hour of uneasy sleep, if the state between dreaming and being awake counted as sleep. Every twenty minutes, she would wake up to the sound of Cassian talking to K-2, and fall asleep again with her head against the metal panel behind her. She dreamt of Cassian, and of Jedha, and of stormtroopers searching through her home while her mother held her hand. She was fourteen, sabotaging Imperial speeders, running through crowded streets to avoid getting caught – but this time she was caught, and a stormtrooper approached her as she was lying on the ground. When he took off his helmet, it was Cassian.

 

-

 

The streets of Jedha were still crowded, and cold – she pulled on her scarf to make it cover more of her neck and face as they walked towards the temple. Cassian had asked her to show him the fastest routes to get there, but she didn’t know if he had done it as a courtesy or if he had realized that he really didn’t know Jedha as well as she did. She knew every shortcut in this city, and they were all coming back to her as they ventured deeper and deeper into the maze of streets. Cassian was right behind her, as was Jyn. They were letting her lead the way. Cassian’s plan was easy, although not foolproof: give Jyn’s name to his contact and hope that she would lead them to Saw Gerrera.

“Hope?” Jyn had said, almost mockingly, and when Cassian had told her that yes, rebellions were built on hope, Nema had thought that this was Cassian whom she actually knew. Someone who believed in what he was doing, who would stop at nothing for the cause. She had always admired that in him – when she was stuck on Yavin 4 and he was home from missions, he would tell her about all the things the Rebellion was doing to keep fighting. Sometimes it wasn’t much, but it was always _something._

She hadn’t missed this place, but it still felt like home, in some strange way – if it hadn’t been for the constant presence of the Empire, with the Destroyer blocking the sun on top of the city and bucketheads on every corner. A local knocked into Jyn, and she flared up like one of Yosh’s explosives. Cassian stepped in before it got ugly, but Nema realized that wherever Jyn had been before, it hadn’t taught her to blend in. At least they had left K-2 on the ship.

Nema didn’t recognize anyone they passed, but most of the people she had known here were probably gone. Her childhood friends were either dead or had joined the Empire. Those who could get off this moon tended to do so. Except the Guardians, of course, who were still hanging around causing trouble. This moon was a holy place for them. Nema had never really understood why.

Cassian grabbed a light hold of her elbow. “Wait for me.”

She nodded, and he disappeared into the crowd, presumably to scout the area. At least he trusted her with making sure Jyn didn’t get into more trouble.

“Nema?”

At first, Nema pretended that she hadn’t heard the woman saying her name. Five years is a long time, and the last time they had met had been when Nema was no more than a child. But she didn’t know if it was the jacket which made her recognizable, or something else – Sheva Rook grabbed her by the shoulder and said:

“It _is_ you.”

Nema forced a small smile while at the same time trying to not lose sight of Jyn, who was venturing dangerously close to the blind Guardian who was chanting.

“Sheva.”

“I can’t believe it.” Sheva was older, Nema noticed – when Nema was younger, Sheva had seemed like an unbreakable woman, someone who always had a spare bed and a bite to eat when Nema couldn’t go home. Her eyes welled up as she looked at Nema, and Nema thought about the almost completely grey hair that had always been black, and the torn coat she was wearing, and the panic in her eyes. “I never thought we’d see you here again.”

“I didn’t think I’d ever go back either, to be honest.” Sheva was still gripping her arm. “Is something wrong?”

Sheva gave a hollow laugh. It sounded more like a cough. Nema threw a glance back at Jyn, who was now talking to the Guardian. _Damn._

“Wrong? Haven’t you seen the holonet?” Sheva pulled on Nema’s arm, pulling her close enough for Sheva to whisper. “They’re looking for my Bodhi. He’s done something…” Sheva took a deep, shuddering breath. “They’ve been at the house. The stormtroopers. Torn everything apart.”

Bodhi Rook. Sheva’s son. He was an imperial pilot, as far as Nema knew. He had left just before Nema did, and she still remembered the tension at the dinner table that last night, and Sheva urging Bodhi to stay. _There’ll be work on Jedha soon, if you just stay._ Bodhi had wanted to become a fighter pilot. She had never known if he had actually made it that far.

Nema caught a glimpse of Cassian walking towards her, and carefully pried Sheva’s hands off of her arm.

“I need to go, Sheva.” The panic returned to the woman’s face, and Nema leaned close again. She had to. This woman had practically raised her. “I’ll find him.”

Breaking free of Sheva’s intense gaze was the hardest part, but Nema had to catch up with Cassian.

“We’re not here to make friends”, Cassian said as she fell into step with him. Nema cast a look back at Sheva, who was still standing where Nema had left her.

“That’s the mother of our pilot”, Nema replied in a hushed voice. “You didn’t tell me his name was Bodhi Rook.”

“You know him?” Cassian looked at her incredulously.

“I grew up with him.”

Cassian called out to Jyn, who was still talking to the Guardian. She joined them, looking a bit dazed and holding a hand to her chest, as if holding on to something hanging around her neck.

“Let’s hope your friend is still alive, then”, Cassian said as he started to move them faster through the crowd.

“You seem awfully tense all of a sudden,” Jyn said. He did; Nema noticed the clenched jaw.

“We have to hurry. This town's ready to blow.”

 

-

 

The fabric was coarse against her face and smelled like it had been used for this exact purpose before, and she tried her best to put one foot in front of the other as they walked.

She had fired her blaster, but the partisans had taken it from her. Her body was still full of adrenaline from that firefight, and she kept seeing the first stormtrooper she shot go down. She had hit him in the middle of his breastplate, and he hadn’t made a sound as he fell. He was probably still lying there, face down in the sand, if the Empire hadn’t retrieved him yet. Dead stormtroopers in the street wasn’t exactly good for morale if you were going to keep the inhabitants of an occupied city under control.

Cassian was next to her. She could tell, since he had been next to her when they put the sacks over their heads, and she had tried to keep track of him by letting their elbows touch every now and then. She knew that they had left the city some time ago. Everything she could hear out here was the shuffling of their footsteps, and the wind whistling over the sand. They were going north – she had walked through the north gate enough times to recognize it. She used to let Bodhi and his friends test her trimmed speeders out here, where they were less likely to get caught.

Bodhi. She hadn’t thought about him for so long, but he had been the reason her mother had practically forced her off the planet. _You don’t want to end up like Bodhi Rook, working for the Empire, do you?_ Now he was a defector with the power to change the course of the war – if they could find him. Right now, they didn’t know whether Saw Gerrera would execute them on sight because Cassian had shot one of his partisans, or if he would let them in because of who Jyn was.

Jyn was walking somewhere in front of her. Nema had heard her arguing with one of Saw’s rebels a while ago. Of course she had argued – Nema had just watched her take down five stormtroopers by herself, using nothing but glorified sticks. Partisans didn’t scare her. She had grown up with them.

She was surrounded by people who knew how to fight, that much was clear – from Jyn, to Chirrut Îmwe who had taken down stormtroopers like it was some sort of violent dance, to Baze who definitely knew how to use a repeater cannon. All Nema had was her basic combat training, which hadn’t taught her much more than which body parts to aim your punches at. She could probably hold her own in one-on-one combat for about as long as a bantha could stand on one leg.

She had known that there was a war. Of course she had. But until now, all she had seen of it had been happening somewhere else. When she had left Jedha, it hadn’t been that bad – there had been Imperial troops, but back when Nema lived here, they had mostly been interested in stripping the planet of its resources, not killing its inhabitants. She had lost people with the Rebel Alliance, but she had never actually seen them die. The ships she had lost just never came back.

Next to the stormtrooper she had shot, she saw the little girl in the square. Nema had run out there without thinking, and Cassian had shot that rebel on the roof for her sake.

“Nema?”

Cassian’s voice, slightly muffled by the fabric covering his face.

“I’m here.”

“Are you cold?”

“It’s alright.” She tried to keep her teeth from chattering.

He didn’t say anything more after that. Without knowing how far they walked, Nema still guessed that they were heading for the catacombs. It was the perfect hideout if you knew the area, which Saw’s rebels obviously did. It was the only possibility that Nema could think of. It was a day’s walk from the city – a lot less on a speeder, Nema knew from experience, but at this pace they would probably be walking all night. Jedha’s permanent winter had already found its way through the layers of her clothes.

It was going to be a long walk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for leaving kudos and comments! It kind of makes my day.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a script-heavy chapter because reasons.

Cassian disappeared from her side as soon as they got indoors. Everything had gone dark as soon as the heavy doors had closed behind them – the sun had risen a couple of hours before, and the sudden darkness was totally disorienting even though Nema hadn’t been able to see much with the sack over her head. Someone ripped it off now and gave her a hard shove forward, and she realized that her surroundings weren’t completely dark. They were inside the old monastery. Sandstone hallways that stretched on forever, a refuge from the cold wind outside. Nema’s mother had warned her about getting lost in here. The catacombs stretched for miles.

“Move!”

Jyn was next to her, also free of her sack, but the others were nowhere to be seen. As Nema stumbled along, trying to keep up with their captors, she heard what was unmistakably an argument in a language Nema couldn’t understand unfolding between the guards behind them.

“They don’t know which one of us is Jyn Erso”, Jyn whispered and threw a look at their captors.

“Should we tell them?”

“Not unless you want to join the others, wherever they are.”

While she and Jyn didn’t look alike, they were of approximately the same build and height, and had similar clothes and hair color. One would think that they would remember which of them had declared that she was the daughter of Galen Erso, but Nema was not about to explain it to them. She just hoped that the others were all right.

“Jyn, is it really you?”

Saw Gerrera was an intimidating man, even with the obvious signs of a worn-down body. Nema could hear the wheezing from the oxygen respirator, and she knew a pressurized suit when she saw one. Saw was also a damaged man.

“I can’t believe it.”

“Must be quite a surprise”, Jyn shot back just as one of the guards grabbed Nema from behind, having realized who the real Jyn Erso was. “Let her go.”

Jyn’s voice was commanding; it was almost as if she had regained some of her former status among the partisans the second Saw recognized her. Nevertheless, the one with the harsh grip on Nema’s arms looked to Saw, who nodded almost unnoticeably, and Nema was released with a huff and another shove to the back. Then, she and Jyn were suddenly alone with Saw Gerrera.

“Are we still not friends?”

The look on Jyn’s face was answer enough. “The last time I saw you, you gave me a knife and loaded blaster and told me to wait in a bunker until daylight.”

“I knew you were safe.”

“You left me behind.”

Nema got the feeling that she was trapped at a dinner table where the hosts had suddenly started arguing, although this particular fight was laden with years and years of betrayal. As Saw went on trying to defend his decision, Nema felt for her blaster only to remember that it wasn’t there anymore.

“It’s a trap, isn’t it?” It was strange to hear fright in the voice of someone like Saw Gerrera. “The pilot. The message. Did they… send you? Did you come here to kill me? There’s not much of me left.” For the first time, Saw looked at Nema. “And you, you’re here to strip me for parts.”

Nema shook her head, wondering if her job title was tattooed on her forehead. “I’m not.”

“Then why are you here? What business do you have with Jyn?”

“I’m with the Rebellion.” Her answer came quicker than she would have thought, and she realized the second she said it that she had never had to defend that to anyone before. She had been surrounded by rebels or people otherwise loyal to the Alliance since she was a child. The only one she had ever had to argue with about joining the Rebellion had been Bodhi, all those years ago.

Saw, however, gave what could only be described as a very broken, hollow laugh. His reinforced lungs obviously weren’t used to the effort. “The Rebellion. And here I thought that you had left every conviction behind, Jyn.”

Jyn didn’t look at Nema as she answered. “The Alliance wants my father. They think he's sent you a message about a weapon. I guess they think by sending me you might actually help them out.”

Of course. Jyn wasn’t a rebel. Saw looked at her, and the disappointment was visible in his face.

“So what is it that you want, Jyn?”

“They wanted an introduction, they've got it. I'm out now. The rest of you can do what you want.”

Jyn spoke quickly, offhandedly, and Nema wondered how she could live with that. But there was a difference between fighting for your life and fighting for a cause. Nema had been sent here as a part of the Rebellion. Jyn had been sent here without having chosen the Rebellion at all.

“You care not about the cause?”

“The cause? Seriously? The Alliance? The… The rebels? Whatever it is you're calling yourself these days?” At this, Jyn threw a dark look at Nema. “All it's ever brought me is pain.”

“You can stand to see the Imperial flag reign across the galaxy?” Saw sounded as troubled as Nema felt.

“It's not a problem if you don't look up.”

Saw paused. They didn’t have time for this, Nema thought. They needed to find Bodhi. Saw must know where he was kept.

“I have something to show you. Come.”

-

The first shake was barely discernible from the usual earthquakes on Jedha. It could just as well have been a ship landing nearby. But it never stopped, and the entire structure started to shake just as the hologram of Galen Erso gave the details on where the plans to the planet killer were located. The Death Star. _There is no better name. And the day is coming soon when it will be unleashed._

Nema caught a glimpse of something through the opening in the wall that she pushed far back in her mind. She grabbed on to Jyn, who was on her knees in the dirt.

“Come on.”

Jyn’s looked at her but didn’t seem to recognize her. The indifference had vanished from her face the moment she had seen her father.

“Nema!”

Cassian. Suddenly there, breathing, rushed. Nema stood up, taking Jyn with her. “We’ve got to go.” He turned to Jyn. “Jyn. I know where your father is.”

Jyn turned to Saw, but the old partisan didn’t move as Nema started to all but drag Jyn away.

“Go with them, Jyn. You must go.”

“Come with us!”

Nema had seen the cybernetic right leg. Even if they took him with them, they wouldn’t get out in time.

“I will run no longer. But you must save yourself.”

She didn’t register the fact that Cassian had grabbed her hand, nor the way she almost stumbled down the stairs but miraculously landed on her feet as the building started to shake more violently. Sand got in her eyes as the sandstone shook loose above their heads, and then they were finally outside, where there was supposed to be sunlight. But the sun was blocked.

She had no choice but to look at it now, and she knew exactly what it was even though her brain wouldn’t register its meaning.

Her city. Her entire childhood. Bodhi’s mother, and the child she had held in her arms as the building next to them exploded. Gone, along with the horizon.

_Not now._

Someone stopped right in front of her, and Cassian lost grip of her hand as she almost collided with Bodhi. He had stopped right outside the doors. She didn’t think before grabbing hold of him instead, forcing him to look away from the destruction.

“Come on, _move_!”

And Bodhi ran with her as the U-wing appeared in front of the tsunami of earth and stone coming towards them.

The sound from outside was deafening as Nema and Bodhi boarded the ship, Nema pushing Bodhi in front of her, and the hatch started to close behind them as the ship took off. Cassian looked back and met her eye for a split second. It hit her that he had been waiting for her to get on board, but it suddenly didn’t seem as important as the fact that she was still alive.

“Get us out of here! Punch it!”

“I’m not very optimistic about our odds.” 

“Not now, K!”

Even though Nema wasn’t a pilot, she knew every part of this ship. The U-wing wasn’t the fastest ship in the fleet, as it was mainly meant for troop transport and drop-offs. She could hear rocks and dirt raining down on the hull, and there wasn’t much light let in through the small windows – not even from the front, and Nema realized with blinding insight that that was because the shockwave of rocks and sand was closing itself around them.

The rest of the people in the cabin were silent, in all probability realizing the same thing as her, and she knew what Cassian was trying to do before it happened. He had no other choice.

“I haven’t completed my calculations –” K-2 was cut off by Cassian who reached overhead to override the hyperdrive protocols.

“I’ll make them for you.”

She wondered if anyone else but her and maybe Bodhi among the passengers knew what the risk of getting torn apart when jumping from atmo to hyperspace was.

She fixed her gaze on Cassian instead of closing her eyes.

 

-

 

“Baze, tell me. All of it? The whole city?”

Chirrut sat next to Nema, and Nema didn’t want to listen.

“All of it.”

Bodhi’s face was ashen, and he seemed to look at her without realizing who she was. It was like he was watching something far beyond her, and Nema shut every thought of Sheva and their city from her mind as she felt the lump in her throat thicken.

She moved to crouch in front of him. “Bodhi.” No reaction. She tried again. “Bodhi. It’s Nema.”

“Nema?” He recognized her now, and she tried to smile as she reached to take his hand. She didn’t know what kind of torture he had endured with Saw’s rebels, but it had messed him up somehow. And he had just watched the same destruction as she had, the one she desperately tried not to think of. The image of Jedha’s non-existence was etched to her mind, and she wondered if it would ever disappear.

Bodhi was a few years older than her. Before he had signed up for the Empire, Nema had always looked up to him – the older boy who could fly every speeder she patched up, and who always trusted her even though she was just a kid with a hand-me-down wrench and dirty goggles. When he had gotten caught with her trimmed airspeeder in the desert, he hadn't given them her name. Nema wondered how much of that boy was still in there.

Next to her, by the comms, Cassian had been sending a message to the Alliance. When he gave K-2 directions to set the course for Eadu, Jyn stood up. “Is that where my father is?”

Cassian looked at her with an unreadable expression. “I think so.”

“You’re Galen’s daughter”, Bodhi said to Jyn, and Nema let go of his hand to stand up. Cassian was still standing by the comms, and he gave her a quick glance. She remembered his hand gripping hers tightly as they struggled to find their way out, and wondered if he had known that he had done that. If gripping her hand was something that came natural to him when running for his life.

“Your father… he said I could get right by myself”, Bodhi said to Jyn. “He said I could make it right, if I was brave enough and listened to what was in my heart. Do something about it.” Nema felt her heart drop as he continued. “Guess it was too late.”

“It wasn’t too late," Jyn said, her voice suddenly filled with hope.

“Seems pretty late to me," Baze growled.

Jyn shook her head and looked at Nema for support. “No. We can beat the people who did this.”

“The message,” Nema said, realizing what she meant. “Your father’s message.” Jyn nodded.

“They call it the Death Star. But they have no idea there's a way to defeat it. You're wrong about my father,” she said, turning to Cassian. “He knew they’d build it without him, so he made a choice. He sacrificed himself for the Rebellion. He’s rigged a trap inside it. That’s why he sent Bodhi, to bring that message.” Nema was glad to hear some kind of spark of optimism in Jyn. Something resembling a will to fight not only for herself.

“Where is it?” Cassian said. “Where is that message?”

“It was a hologram,” Nema said, but she knew that it wasn’t enough. Everything had happened so fast, and neither she nor Jyn had thought about getting that holochip out. Cassian looked at her, and there was a hint of desperation there.

“Did you see it?”

“Yes, but I…” Nema reached for the words. He didn’t believe her. “I didn’t get it out.”

“You don’t believe us," Jyn said, exasperated. “Nema saw it. You don’t believe her either?”

There was a pause, during which Cassian’s look on Nema felt like needles to her skin.

She was just a mechanic. He didn’t even want her on this mission.

“I’m not the one you’ve got to convince.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has commented or left kudos! <3 I'm trying to keep my updates just a few days apart at the most, but that could change if I run into writer's block or suddenly write 2000 words in one day (both of which have been known to happen).


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eadu is not a happy place.
> 
> (I've finally gotten my copy of the Rogue One novelization, so I've been working on getting details right. I recommend it to everyone. Alexander Freed knows his stuff.)

They crashed. The hard winds on Eadu combined with the rocky formations all around them made the U-wing lose altitude and drop into the canyon, and as Nema braced herself for impact, she wondered for a very brief moment what would happen if they all died out here. If their plan to retrieve Jyn’s father and make the Rebellion find the Death Star plans died with them. No one would know what they knew, and Galen Erso’s sacrifice would have been for nothing.

The thought disappeared the moment she realized that she was still alive, and that everybody else on the ship seemed to be as well. The ship itself was another matter. The emergency power was on, but not much else.

“At least they haven’t found us yet,” Baze muttered to her right, and she had to agree that it was better to crash than to be shot down by a TIE fighter.

“Nema.” Cassian’s voice. She looked at him for the first time in hours. She _knew_ that the Alliance needed more than her word to go scampering off to Scarif for supposed Death Star plans, but she wasn’t about to pretend that she knew where she had him anymore. He was waiting for her by the open hatch.

The rain on Eadu was colder than any rain she had ever felt. It soaked through the hood of her scarf in seconds, and by the time she and Cassian had had a look at the engine, her hair was soaking wet. She could see even now that the ship was too far gone.

“It’s no use,” Nema replied, shaking her head. “You see that rip in the port engine?”

“We’ve got to try. Come on.”

Twenty-four hours ago, holding Cassian’s hand as he steadied her climbing up on the U-wing’s right side would have been a big deal. It still was, for some part of her, but she tried to concentrate on the stabilizer instead.

“Tell Bodhi to try and fire it up”, she called out to Cassian after having fixed what little she could without spare parts. “It’s a long shot, but it could work.”

Cassian disappeared into the ship, and by the time Nema had made her way back down to the ground and through the hatch, the stabilizer was officially out of commission.

“We’ll have to hope there’s still an imperial ship left to steal”, Cassian said as Nema wiped the water droplets from her forehead. “Bodhi, you’re coming with me. We’ll go up the ridge and check it out.”

“I’m coming with you,” Jyn said without hesitating.

“No, your father's message”, Cassian said. “We can't risk it. You're the messenger.”

 _He’s lying,_ Nema thought. _Why is he lying?_

“That's ridiculous. We all got the message. Everyone here knows it,” Jyn said, motioning to the rest of the makeshift crew. Nema, who was wringing out her scarf before putting it back on, kept her eyes on Cassian. His jaw was set again, and she knew that something was up other than the obvious fact that they were stranded in Imperial territory.

“ _One blast to the reactor module and the whole system goes down._ That's how you said it. _The whole system goes down._ ” K-2SO was rewarded for his input with a lethal glare from Cassian.

“Get to work fixing our comms,” he said harshly. “All I want to do right now is get a handle on what we're up against. So, we're going to go very small and very carefully up the rise and see what's what.” He glanced at Nema for a second, but looked away as she looked back and started to prepare his gear without waiting for any more protests.

Bodhi stopped next to Nema before going out. “I’m glad you’re here,” he said, almost as if he had just now realized it. “I’m glad you made it out.”

Nema knew that he didn’t mean just the fact that she had gotten out alive from Jedha. She smiled, and he gave her the first hesitant smile back she had seen from him since grabbing hold of him just a few hours ago. At least it was something. That they were both alive, and that they had both made it off the planet when they were kids.

Bodhi followed Cassian out, and they were swallowed up by the darkness and the storm and the mud.

“I’ll see if I can help with the comms,” Nema said to Jyn, who nodded while watching the spot where Cassian and Bodhi had disappeared.

“Does he look like a killer?”

Nema had just opened the panel next to where K-2 was standing when she heard Chirrut’s voice. Baze’s reply came after a couple of seconds.

“No. He has the face of a friend.”

“Who are you talking about?”

Nema looked away from the panel to Jyn, who was still standing by the hatch.

“Captain Andor,” Baze said.

“What do you mean, does he look like a killer?” Nema said, suddenly feeling cold in a way that had nothing to do with being soaking wet. “Why do you ask that?”

“The Force moves darkly near a creature that's about to kill,” Chirrut said, as if it was a well-known fact.

Nema had never really believed in the Force. Not in the way that Chirrut did. Growing up on Jedha, she had been constantly surrounded by people who did believe in it, but she had never actually seen it do anything. The jedi were nothing but stories, and the statues in the sand surrounding the Holy City nothing more than remnants of a different time. But she didn’t have to believe in the Force to know that Chirrut was right, and that what had bothered her with Cassian’s behavior was not just her imagination.

K-2 looked away from the comms for a second. “His weapon _was_ in the sniper configuration.”

Jyn’s eyes widened, and Nema knew what she was about to do. She had seen Jyn’s face the moment that hologram had showed her father’s figure.

There were field garments and equipment in a storage box in the back. Before Jyn had even made it out the hatch, Nema was there sifting through the contents of the box. Two Alliance regulation ponchos, two caps and two pairs of goggles.

“Jyn.” Nema threw the first bundle to her, and she caught it, giving Nema a surprised look which quickly changed into determination.

“You don’t have to come,” Jyn said as they pulled the garments over their heads and headed out through the hatch. If Chirrut and Baze had anything to say about their departure, it was only the slight grunt of disapproval that Baze gave as Nema passed by him.

“Yes, I do”, Nema replied, adjusting her cap and her goggles and making sure the breathing mask around her neck wasn’t totally worn down. The rain was still pouring down, but at least now she had some kind of protective clothing. “I have a better chance than you of talking him out of it.” She sounded a lot more sure of that than she felt, and Jyn snorted.

“He doesn’t seem to be the type who listens to anyone.”

She was probably right. Cassian had orders which Nema knew nothing about, and what was Cassian if not one who followed orders? The only time Nema had seen Cassian do anything that resembled disobeying an order was when he had told her about the rumors of the planet killer. And that had been different. That had been him trying to protect her, before either of them knew the magnitude of that weapon. Before she became a part of this fight for real, where Cassian had little chance of protecting her at all.

They sprinted along the slippery path that Cassian and Bodhi had gone down, Jyn leading the way. Eadu was not a very welcoming place – Nema knew from the U-wings data on this planet that it wasn’t night, even though they were engulfed in darkness as they made their way towards the light in the distance. The Imperial compound. The darkness was still to their advantage, however – without it, they would have been spotted during the U-wings descent. What little warmth she had accumulated on the ship was gone in a matter of minutes, and even though the coat offered a little protection from the wind, it soon felt as if she was soaked to her skin.

They didn’t speak until they reached a junction in the road, or at least a junction in possible ways to travel over mud and rock. To the right were more rocks, leading up against the mountain side, and to the left there seemed to be a path leading further into the canyon.

“They were just checking out the ridge,” Nema said. “They must have gone this way.” She pointed right, upward, but Jyn was already on her way down the other path. “Where are you going?”

“If my father’s up there, I have to get to him before Cassian does.”

“Are you kidding me?” Nema said, grabbing a hold of Jyn’s shoulder.

Jyn shook herself loose and looked Nema in the eye – a cold, hard stare which made Nema think that whatever spark for the rebellion Jyn had shown on the ship, it wasn't equal to the need she had to find her father. “You don’t have to come. You can go after Cassian if you think you have any chance of talking him into not to killing my father. I’d prefer not to take my chances with that.”

Then she turned her back to Nema and started to make her way down. Nema stood still for a good five seconds, listening to the howling of the wind and the pounding of her own heart.

Cassian was behind her, on that ridge, and Nema had no idea what to tell him if she found him. _Please don’t kill Jyn’s father._ Pathetic. He wouldn’t listen to _her_ , the mechanic he had gotten stuck with who had never seen the war up close before. But Cassian hadn’t seen Galen Erso’s face as he spoke to his daughter on that hologram. Cassian hadn’t seen Jyn break in front of that hologram, for a moment being just an abandoned girl who hadn’t seen her father in fifteen years.

The mud seeped into her boots as Nema slid down the slope.

 

-

 

The service ladder was metal, and her already cold hands were numb by the time they had gotten halfway up. Jyn was above her, climbing at a pace that seemed almost inhuman, and Nema struggled to keep up. She was used to climbing and to holding herself steady on unstable constructions and hulls as she worked on the ships, but she wasn’t used to doing it in a howling storm. And she suspected that what was making Jyn keep climbing relentlessly was the hope of seeing her father up there – for Nema, it was more the fact that she didn’t want to fall to her death. Up was easier than down. At least she wasn’t afraid of heights.

_What was she even doing there?_

Following Jyn. Making sure she didn’t get herself killed.

 _This was a stupid idea_ . Nema repeated that to herself half of the way; the other half she was just concentrating on staying alive. She almost lost her grip a couple of times, and bit her lip to keep from crying out. _Don’t look down._ Jyn was hauling herself upward more than climbing, desperate to reach the top.

When they finally did and Jyn climbed over the edge, Nema was inches away from being pulled down into the canyon by the stormtrooper Jyn overpowered. He fell wordlessly, and Nema didn’t look down. Jyn grabbed her forearm to help her up, whispering an apology before they edged along the platform and crouched behind cargo crates to get a look at things. Jyn had managed to get a hold of the stormtrooper’s rifle. At least one of them had a weapon.

They heard voices, but from a distance – stormtroopers were spread across the platform, standing guard, among Imperial officers and stormtroopers dressed in black. In the middle, a man in white – and in front of him was Galen Erso, kneeling next to half a dozen bodies of people who must have just been killed. Their blaster wounds were still smoking in the cold air. Nema felt Jyn stiffen at her side before she reached for her newly acquired rifle. She didn’t have to guess who she was aiming for.

 _Don’t miss,_ Nema thought. _If we’re going to die here anyway, don’t miss this shot._ No matter how she tried, she couldn’t see a way out of this – she had followed Jyn into this death trap, and she had to see it through. Taking out a high-ranking Imperial officer didn’t seem like such a bad way to go.

She heard the X-wing before she saw it. Jyn didn’t have the chance to take the shot before Nema saw it diving towards the platform. She saw rather than heard the laser cannons at the same time as the alarm started to sound, and the rifle slipped out of position as Nema put her arm around Jyn to pull her to the ground. Sparks rained over them as the platform was engulfed in flames and smoke and the searing smell of burning metal.

On the ridge, Cassian slung his rifle over his shoulder and started to run.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leaving Eadu and getting some well-deserved sleep. Cassian is good at warming hands.

Of course, the X-wing wasn’t alone, but Nema couldn’t stop Jyn from rushing towards her father as soon as the first round from the laser cannons ceased. 

“Jyn, get  _ down!”  _ she yelled, not caring about stealth anymore. The mayhem on the platform worked to their advantage, but it wouldn’t work for long if Jyn didn’t keep her head down. But now she was gone, and Nema crept out from behind her cover to see Jyn standing there, exposed, still holding her rifle but without aiming it.

“Papa!”

And Galen Erso looked at his daughter for a split second before another X-wing dove, and its plasma cannons ripped a hole in the platform itself. Nema felt the shockwave lift her off her feet and slam her down on the platform behind her before she had even realized what had happened – she couldn’t hear anything but the screech of metal and the thunder of the explosion, and she had to take a few breaths just to remember where she was. Stars specked her vision as she struggled to sit up, and breathing was suddenly much harder than it had been just a few moments ago. She tasted metal and realized that she had bit her tongue hard enough to bleed.

She struggled to sit up, and she didn’t see Jyn at first. There were bodies around her, burning stormtroopers and officers hit by the X-wings’ lasers – everything seemed to be on fire, including her own lungs, and the smoke in the air stung her eyes.

A figure was slowly standing up in the smoke, seemingly swaying from the effort.  _ Jyn.  _ The other woman started to stagger along the platform, obviously trying to run. She didn’t even try to take cover, but none of the imperials left alive seemed to notice her. Nema heard distant shouting and saw two officers supporting the man in white into the shuttle. Jyn had given up trying to kill that man, for the moment – instead, she was focused on a body lying among the debris.

Nema didn’t have a chance to get to her feet before the shuttle took off, and the strong engine backwash it projected made her fall down again, desperately clinging to anything stable to keep from getting pushed off the platform. She didn’t need to look to know that she was already close to the edge.

She tried again, pushing herself up, pushing against the ache that spread throughout her body. She had hit the platform harder than she’d thought, and she noticed without feeling it that she had scraped both her hands to the point of bleeding.

The shuttle had disappeared, and the platform seemed to be empty of stormtroopers for the moment – although not for long, Nema suspected. She stumbled towards Jyn, trying not to trip over dead bodies. Some of them were burnt beyond recognition, and she tried not to look at their faces.

Jyn was kneeling next to her father, holding him to her chest. He was dying, Nema realized as she came closer. He was breathing, still, but Jyn was crying as Galen’s hand reached up to touch her cheek.

Nema had seen death up close before this. On Jedha, a man had fallen down from a ladder just outside her mother’s house, and Nema had been the first one there; on Dantooine, one of the recruits in her unit had gotten the whole weight of an X-wing with faulty landing gear over him, and he had died before the medical droids had gotten him to the infirmary. But the image of Galen Erso’s dying form was something else. For a few seconds, Nema couldn’t bring herself to get any closer – Jyn was sobbing, clutching her father’s body to her, desperately feeling for a heartbeat or a breath, and Nema just stood there with the image of one of her commanding officers; her downcast gaze and the last transmission Nema would ever get from Jedha, the one that was several months delayed because of imperial blockades.  _ I’m sorry, Ress, but we’ve only just gotten word about your mother. _

Nema’s mother hadn’t been perfect, but then again, she guessed that Galen Erso hadn’t been the perfect father either. But the resentment towards him that Jyn had held was gone now. It was hard being angry at someone who had always loved you.

Nema stowed away the feeling as best she could as she closed in on Jyn and Galen. Galen was dead now – she could see it even though Jyn didn’t seem to have accepted it yet.

“Papa.” Jyn’s voice was barely above a whisper. “No, no…”

Jyn smoothed his hair away from his forehead, and Nema placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Jyn, we’ve got to go.”

“I can’t leave him!” Jyn said, her voice small and panicked. Nema looked at Galen one more time, but he was gone. It was strange to think that the man in the hologram was the same man who was lying here, broken. They had been so close.  _ At least it wasn’t Cassian who killed him,  _ Nema thought for a second before she realized that Jyn wouldn’t see it that way. Jyn would only see the Alliance ships firing at her father.

Nema kneeled down next to Jyn, meeting her gaze, taking hold of the hands holding her father’s body. “Listen to me,” she said, trying to keep her voice steady. “He’s gone. There’s nothing you can do. We have to get away from here.” Jyn still looked her in the eye as Nema gently uncurled her fingers and grabbed her arm, pulling her into a standing position.

A blaster shot went off, and Nema saw a stormtrooper in white fall down – and behind him, Cassian, appearing as if from within the smoke. Nema had no idea where he had come from or why he was there, but it didn’t matter. She pulled Jyn along with her, leaving Galen’s body, and met Cassian halfway to the blast doors.

“Galen is dead”, she said curtly, still holding on to Jyn who was limping and probably still in shock. Cassian nodded, looking at Jyn for a second before looking back at Nema. She had expected him to be angry with her –  _ endangering the mission, following Jyn into the storm, nearly getting yourself killed _ – but all she saw in his face was relief. He looked at her as if he couldn’t believe that she was standing there, and frankly, Nema was surprised herself. It only lasted for as long as it took for them to hear running steps coming towards them.

“Come on,” Cassian said, raising his weapon towards the stormtroopers approaching. Jyn finally found her footing as Nema grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the walkway.

The Alliance squadron had left, and even if they had still been close, Nema doubted that it would have been to their benefit. The fact that the squadron had been called in at all meant that Draven hadn’t expected their mission to be successful. Now, they were just collateral – another crew of rebels sacrificed for the cause. She shouldn’t let it get to her. She was lucky to have gotten this far. They had to cross the canyon floor to get back to their rendezvous point, where they could only hope that Bodhi had actually managed to steal a ship. Their mission  _ had  _ failed. It was up to them to make it out alive, just like on Jedha.

Blaster shots lit up the rocks around them as they ran, trying not to slip in the mud. Nema could hear Cassian trying to reach K-2SO on his commlink, but he didn’t get through. A blaster shot hit the rock in front of them, and Nema looked back to the pursuing stormtroopers. They were too close. Cassian turned as well, aimed his weapon, but there were too many for just one rifle. And in front of them, an imperial cargo shuttle suddenly rose above the ridge. Nema shielded her eyes from the backwind and waited for it to fire. She had never been shot. With those laser cannons, she probably wouldn’t feel much if it got a direct hit.

But the laser cannons turned under it, and aimed behind them. Flashes of red. The stormtroopers fell, screaming, and the shuttle’s boarding ramp opened with the ship still hovering, swaying in the storm.

“Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” Bodhi called from inside, and she was already running.

 

-

 

Nema pulled off her wet protective gear as soon as they had left the atmosphere, but everything on her body seemed to be soaking. There were scrapes on every part of her that wasn’t covered, and they were starting to sting now that she had time to care. Her whole body hurt, she realized. And she was so very tired.

Bodhi had looked at her as she had climbed on board, but she had the feeling that she had failed him in some way. Galen wasn’t with them, and Galen had meant something to Bodhi. She had heard it in his voice.  _ He said I could make it right, if I was brave enough and listened to what was in my heart.  _ Nema hadn’t been able to make Bodhi turn away from the Empire, but Jyn’s father had.

Now, Bodhi was concentrated on the ship. Nema knew why. She wanted something to fix as well – something to get her mind off everything, something  _ safe.  _ But this ship wasn’t in need of her skills. So she stood motionless for a full minute, clutching her dripping coat and not being able to figure out what to do with it, before Cassian came up next to her. He looked at her while he stripped off his jacket, putting it on the floor with the rest of his gear, before he put his hands over hers. She wasn’t seeing him at first.

“Come on.” She didn’t know what he wanted, but at last she let go of the garment in her hands and he dropped it into the pile as well. His eyes were gentle, watching her, and she wondered why. She had failed him. She had failed everything.

“You’re fine,” he said, and her eyes followed his hands as they took hers again. Warming them, holding them between his own at least slightly warmer palms. Nothing more, but still so much. “We’re okay.”

_ Not everyone,  _ she thought. But Jyn seemed to be doing what Jyn did best, what she had been doing since the moment Nema met her – turning hurting into rage.

“You lied to me,” Jyn said to Cassian, approaching from the other side of the cabin, and Cassian flinched for just a second. Nema could feel the others watching them; Bodhi, climbing down from the cockpit, and Chirrut and Baze who had appeared behind them as they had just went up the boarding ramp on Eadu.

“You’re in shock,” Cassian said, regaining his composure and letting go of Nema’s hands. They were almost instantly cold again, just like the rest of her. Cassian turned to Jyn.

“You went up there to kill my father.” Jyn’s voice wasn’t weak anymore.

“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

But Nema could see the struggle in him. They all knew. There was no use in denying it now, but he hadn’t been the one to kill Galen. It shouldn’t matter what he had set out to do, but it still did.

“Deny it.” Jyn stared at Cassian, unwavering, and Cassian stared back. “You went up there to kill my father.”

“You’re in shock,” Cassian repeated, “and looking for someplace to put it. I’ve seen it before.”

“I bet you have.” Her voice was acidic. Jyn nodded to Nema, and pointed to the rest of the crew. “They know. You lied about why we came here and you lied about why you went up alone.”

It was hard, looking at Cassian, because she still didn’t know where she had him. One moment, he was warming her hands, looking at her like nothing had changed since that last night on the base, and the next he was a different person, the other side of him which Nema hadn’t known until now. She hadn’t known him at all, she thought. Whatever pain he had shown her before, those shards of the other world he lived in – it was just a fragment of what he was showing now. He took a step towards Jyn.

“I had every chance to pull the trigger. But did I?”

“You might as well have. My father was living proof and you put him at risk. Those were Alliance bombs that killed him!”

“I had orders! Orders that I disobeyed!” Cassian’s voice was hard, frustrated. “But you wouldn’t understand that.”

“Orders? When you know they're wrong? You might as well be a stormtrooper.”

Nema kept her eyes on her hands, not knowing where else to look. Jyn’s words cut through everything, and she felt hollow. She knew, somewhere, that Jyn was right, and that her anger was somehow justified. But Cassian didn’t deserve this. Cassian was just… a soldier. Jyn had never been tied to anything like Cassian was, like Nema was – to something bigger than herself, to a world where you sometimes had to close your eyes to things that happened around you for a greater cause. The order to kill her father didn’t seem logical to Jyn, but to Draven, Galen Erso had been just another part in a war which no one knew if they even had a chance to win.

“What do you know?” Cassian spat. “We don't all have the luxury of deciding when and where we want to care about something. Suddenly the Rebellion is real for you? Some of us live it.” He was closer to Jyn now, his body tense. “I've been in this fight since I was six years old.” He said this with such emphasis that Nema had to look up. She never knew that. There were a lot of things she didn’t know about him. “You're not the only one who lost everything. Some of us just decided to do something about it.”

“You can’t talk your way out of this,” Jyn said.

“I don’t have to.”

Nema saw Jyn’s rage, but it never exploded – for a moment, though, Nema thought that she was about to hit Cassian. It wouldn’t have been surprising. It was as if everyone else in the room let out a breath they had been holding when she turned around, and Cassian looked away.

“Yavin 4!” he called out to K-2SO in the cockpit. “Make sure they know we’re coming in with a stolen ship.” Nema was watching him, as were all the others except Jyn, who had retreated to the far end of the cabin. He threw a dark look at them. “Anybody else?”

But nobody said anything. What could they say? It wasn’t like they could take sides – at least Nema couldn’t. Jyn was hurting, but Cassian had abandoned his mission. And Galen was still dead, no matter how much they fought.

Bodhi disappeared into the cockpit again, and was followed by Cassian who presumably wanted to get as far away from Jyn as possible. Nema wondered for a moment if she should talk to Jyn, but quickly realized that Jyn didn’t want to be talked to – she saw her disappear into the engine compartment, eyes downcast and shoulders tense. Instead, Nema pulled herself up from the floor, feeling her whole body ache with the effort and her still wet clothes sticking to her body uncomfortably.

Cassian looked at her as she appeared at the top of the ladder, but didn’t say anything. She didn’t know what to tell him, either. She tried to smile, failed, and went to talk to Bodhi who was sitting next to K-2SO, overseeing the controls. They had made the jump to hyperspace before Cassian’s and Jyn’s argument.

“Did you ever learn how to fly?” Bodhi asked when he saw her. She actually smiled now.

“I’m better than I was,” Nema replied, eyeing the equipment for a second before turning back to Bodhi. “Do you remember when I tried to show you…”

“... how to fire up that speeder, and you crashed into the wall of your mother’s house? I remember,” Bodhi said, smirking. “I never got how you were such an engine wiz and at the same time couldn’t fly a ship to save your life.”

“Hey, it’s not like I didn’t know how, I just didn’t get that much of a thrill out of it.” She had never had the reflexes to become a pilot. She froze too easily, thought about things for too long, and didn’t like the speed.

Bodhi laughed, and it was probably the best sound she had heard since leaving Yavin 4. She saw a flash of the teenager she had known on Jedha, but the image was gone in a second. Bodhi still had his Imperial pilot suit on, and she was still freezing in a stolen Imperial shuttle.

They went silent, Bodhi focusing on the controls, and K-2 looked at her for a moment before turning back to them as well. She wondered what the droid was thinking but knew better than to ask. After a few moments, she took a deep breath and said what she had come up here to say.

“I’m sorry about Galen.” Bodhi didn’t look at her, but she knew that he had heard her because his hands stilled. “He was important to you, and we went out there to save him, and we didn’t. And I’m sorry.” She felt her voice starting to break, and went quiet before it could. She wasn’t like Jyn – she hadn’t been hardened against loss and heartbreak to the point of knowing how to turn it into something she could use.

“Nema…” Bodhi glanced at her, but looked away, hesitant. She had been right. She could see it in the way his eyes glazed over, in the way he couldn’t look her in the eye. “Thank you. But you know it’s not your fault.”

She didn’t reply. She  _ couldn’t  _ reply – maybe she couldn’t have saved Galen, but what if she hadn’t held Jyn up, what if she had climbed faster, what if she had done  _ something? _

She turned away from Bodhi after a few excruciating seconds of silence, and realized that her hands were shaking. Her whole body was shaking, not only from the cold, but from the adrenaline leaving her system – she didn’t have the energy to keep warm anymore, and there didn’t seem to be any warmth on this whole ship. The tropical heat of Yavin 4 was hours away.

Cassian was sitting with his back to the wall. He had closed his eyes, and Nema stood by the open ladder hatch for a moment before deciding. He opened his eyes as she sat down next to him on the floor.

“Hey,” he said. He hadn’t been sleeping, she could hear that, but she could see the exhaustion on his face.

“Hey.”

She leaned back against the panel as well, this time not caring about the closeness to his body. His clothes were still wet; his jacket hadn’t shielded him either. But she sat close enough to him for their thighs to almost touch, and maybe that would be enough to gain some warmth. She didn’t know if it was the ship that was cold, or mostly her.

He was quiet, and when she glanced at him he had closed his eyes again – it was comforting, in some way, to know that she wasn’t the only one who was tired. She didn’t realize that she was falling asleep until she felt Cassian shift beside her, but she still wondered if it was a dream. There was sudden warmth in that dream, and the steady rhythm of someone else’s breathing, and the low hum of the engine made her feel almost safe – at home, like in her bed on the base, where the distant roars of the ships coming in or flying out mixed with the hum of the ventilation system. Where Arro would barge in, looking for her before combat training, and where Shara would grin at her and tell her that today was the day when everything would change. Where Cassian would smile at her after coming back from a mission, and where she would fall asleep on his shoulder on a warm night outside the hangar.

The hum changed, and K-2SO’s voice was close.

“If you two are done dozing off, General Draven wants you, Cassian.”

She was on the floor in a stolen Imperial shuttle entering the atmosphere of Yavin 4, and Cassian’s arm left her shoulders as he stood to take the call. 


	7. Chapter 7

Bodhi, Chirrut and Baze were taken away for debriefing by the Intelligence officers. Not that brusquely, but enough to make Bodhi give her a nervous glance as he passed her with an officer behind him. She gave him what she hoped was an encouraging smile, and he seemed a bit more at ease – at least as much as could be expected when you were wearing the Imperial crest on an Alliance base. Chirrut held his head high with Baze in tow.

Cassian and Jyn were going to give their statements to the council, and even though Nema gave the refresher a longing thought, she came with them. The base was filled with important ships and delegates – she and Bodhi had gawked at some of them, sleek ships and expensive ships that they had seen maybe once before in their lives, if ever. The Alliance was taking this seriously, and it seemed that they were bringing in every important ally they could think of.

“That doesn’t mean that they’ll make a good decision,” Cassian had said grimly when Nema had pointed it out.

Yavin 4 was, as expected, wrapped in the same tropical heat as always. It was almost as if she had never left. Thel waved to her as she walked by, and she realized that she had only been gone a couple of days, not weeks, even though that was what it felt like. More than once she had thought that she would never see this place again, and now, she felt alienated from it. How could she go back to her usual job after this? How could anyone just stay here on the ground when there was so much to do out there? They passed the landing pad where she had sat with Cassian, forever and not that long ago, now occupied by General Syndulla's modified Corellian freighter. She felt the memory of Cassian's arm around her shoulders, and his heartbeat against her ear from just an hour ago, and wondered if he had felt as safe with her as she had with him.

Jyn seemed to have cooled off after disappearing into the engine compartment, and she was walking next to Nema with fierce purpose. There was something new about her, and something decidedly more hopeful than just a few hours ago.

“You don’t have to come,” Cassian said from her left. “They just want me and Jyn to give our statements. You could go and clean up and I’ll find you afterwards.”

“I want to know what they decide,” Nema replied, trying to stop her heart from beating faster at the thought of him not just dumping her on the base the minute the mission was over. “It wouldn’t feel right not to be there.”

Cassian nodded, and they walked in silence deeper into the temple towards the briefing room. It was already packed with people, and Nema nearly lost sight of Cassian – she placed a hand on his arm, and turned around to look for Jyn only to find that the other woman was nowhere to be seen. The crowd was dense and people were restless.

Nema didn’t really know what to expect. Politicians, senators and officers from all over the galaxy seemed to be present, and when senator Mothma spoke to the crowd, they all went silent. It was clear that this council had been called not only to persuade its members to join the fight against the Empire’s new weapon, but to convince them that the weapon actually existed and that it could be destroyed. Bodhi had been brought to the room and gave his statement on what he had seen while with the Empire on Eadu; Cassian stepped up to tell the council members of their mission. “Operation Fracture.” Nema hadn’t been aware that it had a name. Cassian made it sound clean and effective, albeit not successful – not the panicked mess that Nema remembered. When he stepped down, he returned to her side.

“They’re not going to act on it,” he whispered. “Even if they believe us, they won’t risk it.”

“What?” She looked at him, frowning. “How can you be sure?”

“They’re politicians,” he said. “They won’t risk an outright war if they can help it.”

 _But there’s nothing to prevent, we’ve been at war for years,_ Nema wanted to say, but just then, Jyn stepped up to speak. She was good at hiding it, but Nema saw how nervous she was, and Nema was happy that they hadn’t asked her to testify. Jyn was questioned on things that obviously struck a nerve, and she wasn’t very diplomatic – but Nema hoped that that also worked to her advantage. Jyn had _fire._ Nema had seen Galen’s message, but her retelling it wouldn’t have mattered. The crowd was more interested in whether or not the message was true than if there had actually been a message. Jyn was better at defending it than Nema would have been.

Cassian signaled that he was leaving just as she had heard enough as well, and he sighed heavily when they stepped out of the briefing room.

“You were right,” she said as they started to walk towards the hangar. “It sounds like they’ve already decided.”

“Better to run and hide than to sacrifice yourself for something,” Cassian muttered. “It doesn’t matter that Jyn just lost her father. It won’t even matter that you just lost your entire _city.”_ At this, he looked at her, remorseful. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine.” She caught herself, gave a hollow laugh, and said: “No, it’s not fine, but I…” She thought about his words on the ship. _You’re not the only one who lost everything._ “In terms of home, I guess I have mine here. Jedha hadn’t been my home since I was a child.”

They passed one of her recruits, who looked at her as if he’d seen a ghost. She thought that that wasn’t far from the truth.

“I need your help,” Cassian said after a moment of silence. “You know the people in Basteren’s unit.”

“Arro? Yes, of course I do.”

“Good. I need to talk to them.”

 

-

 

Arro had been having lunch when they had found him, and before Cassian had even had the chance to state what he had been telling Nema about on the way over, Arro had engulfed her in a hug hard enough for her to feel her sore ribs very acutely.

“I thought you were _dead,”_ he’d said. Nema had wanted to tell him about all the times she had thought that she was going to die, but there hadn’t been time. Now, Arro was sitting with those of his squad that had stayed on the other side of the table from her and Cassian. Yosh was there, and Melshi – she knew all of them, and they looked at her and Cassian with fierce determination. Nema knew that they were afraid, but these people were trained to handle that. Cassian had just told them about the council, and what was likely to come out of it, and about what he was planning to do. Volunteer. Rebel against the council’s decision. Join the fight on their own terms. And they had all agreed.

“There have to be more of us,” Melshi said. “I think I know some people.”

“Good. We’ll meet up with Jyn when the council’s ended,” Cassian said. Because even if no one had said so, they all knew that Jyn was going be leading this fight. Her and Cassian, and for some reason, they looked at Nema that way, too. _I’m just a mechanic,_ she wanted to say. _I don’t know how to do this._ But maybe she did.

The group scattered, leaving to prepare for what was inevitably becoming a very unsanctioned and dangerous mission, but Arro stayed for a moment.

“I didn’t believe it when they told me you’d gone out with a mission with Cassian,” he said, and Nema threw an involuntary look at Cassian who was talking to Melshi a few metres away.

“It was Jedha,” she said, and it stung to say it. “I know… I knew Jedha, that’s why they wanted me.”

Arro furrowed his brow. “I’m sorry.” There was nothing more to say. Arro was her friend – he had been there after she had gotten the news of her mother, and she had been with him for every combat training, every late night listening to the holonet broadcast telling them about the latest losses, and every bottle of Jawa beer they had gotten their hands on on this planet and on Dantooine. They had taught each other everything they knew about living in this war, and she was glad that he was coming with them even though she also wanted to tell him to stay.

“Nema!” Cassian called, and she waved to him to let him know that she was coming. Arro let out a sound between a laughter and a sigh.

“I guess this was always going to happen,” he said, and Nema raised an eyebrow. He laughed. “You going off into the sunset with Cassian Andor and leaving me in the dirt.”

Nema rolled her eyes. Even if it was only for this moment, they were back to their usual routine. “I thought you liked the dirt,” she said and Arro laughed again before watching her turn to Cassian.

“Hey,” he said then, his voice low and serious. “You two don’t have long before we have to leave. Make the best of it.”

Nema didn’t know what to say to that.

 

-

 

She packed for a trip which she knew nothing about. Her room was the same as it has been that morning when she had left – her bunk, and the folded blanket, and her work boots and her goggles, still lying there. She stripped out of her dirty clothes and acknowledged that she was as bruised and in need of a shower as she felt, and then changed into slightly cleaner clothes. She ran a hand through her hair, untangling a few knots with her fingers, and looked into Shara’s mirror.

What was she doing? Preparing for another trip she wasn’t sure she’d get back from?

 _But you’re not getting back from this one._ Going to Scarif to find the plans for the Death Star was as close to suicidal as she could imagine. Even with all the people around her who knew how to fight, they were still only one rebel ship against an entire planet of Imperials. Her brown eyes looked back at her, and her face was stained with dirt and tears and sweat.

There wasn’t really any time to think. There wasn’t time to _make the best of it,_ no matter what Arro said. But when Nema had last looked into this mirror, she hadn’t yet fallen asleep on Cassian’s shoulder, or felt his hand in hers as they ran for their lives. She hadn’t seen her childhood home disintegrate, and she hadn’t pulled her friend away from their father’s lifeless body.

Cassian must have been standing in the doorway for more than a minute when he said her name.

“I’m going to gather everyone,” he said. “Are you coming?”

She nodded without looking at him and picked up her holster from the bed. “I’ll be right out.”

When she turned to him, still fastening the holster, he was looking at her with something unreadable on his face. His eyes were darker, and his eyes flickered to her holster and back to her eyes again.

“Is something wrong?”

Everything was wrong. Cassian was standing in her doorway, and they were about to head out on what was probably going to be their last mission. She couldn’t muster any positivity regarding this, other than the hope that they would at least succeed in getting the plans off the planet in some way. Cassian shook his head.

“I was about to tell you that you don’t need to come. But…”

“But you know that I have to.” She finally got the holster in place and grabbed her jacket from the end of the bed.

“Exactly.”

She still hadn’t figured him out, and before Jedha, she hadn’t thought that she needed to. She had thought that her crush would disappear with time, if she just stopped spending as much time with him – but now, having been this close to death with him, there was nothing she could do. And she couldn’t even call it a crush anymore. She couldn’t crush on someone who had saved her life. She could only recognize that he probably was the single most important person in her life right now, and that she desperately wanted to be close to him before their mission ended with disaster.

She wished that she could tell him. But she smiled, and he smiled back, and when she passed him on her way out the door she still felt his eyes on her.


	8. Chapter 8

When they met up with Jyn in the hangar, Nema could see exactly how well the council had ended. Jyn was in a state between rage and hopelessness, and Bodhi, Chirrut and Baze were failing in calming her down. Even when she turned to see the group of soldiers coming her way, she was holding herself as if getting ready to attack. Even when Cassian and Nema stood before her, Jyn balled her fists.

“They were never going to believe you,” Cassian said. “Not the council. Not today.”

But Jyn still thought that they were going to fight her. Bodhi threw Nema a questioning look, and Nema said: “But we do, Jyn. We believe you,” before things could get out of hand, and Jyn looked at her incredulously.

“We’d like to volunteer,” Cassian said, and Nema smiled at Jyn despite the seriousness of the situation. Jyn looked at the soldiers – their ragged appearance, their solemn faces, and Arro who was standing just behind Nema. Jyn shook her head.

“Why?”

Cassian took a breath, and Nema thought that he hesitated with a look on her before he said: “Some of us… _most_ of us,” he corrected himself, “we’ve done terrible things on behalf of the rebellion. We’re spies. Saboteurs. Assassins.” Cassian spoke with a different tone of voice than the one he usually had with Jyn – he wasn’t on his guard, and there was no anger. Just this confession. Nema knew some things of all the horrible things he had done, but she rarely heard him speak about them like this. “Everything I did, I did for the rebellion. And every time I walked away from something I wanted to forget, I told myself it was for a cause that I believed in. A cause that was worth it. Without that, we’re lost. Everything we’ve done would have been for nothing.” And it was as if his words resonated within the tiredness of Nema’s bones, and bounced off the memory of every stormtrooper she had taken down during the last twenty-four hours. Cassian glanced at her, as if asking for support. Nema was close enough to take his hand just by moving her own hand a few inches. She did. He grasped it, and his fingers were warm. “I couldn’t face myself if I gave up now. None of us could.”

Jyn looked at them as if she couldn’t believe it, and the anger was gone from her face. Cassian was still holding Nema’s hand when Bodhi spoke.

“It won’t be comfortable.” He looked at the shuttle they had arrived in. “It’ll be a bit cramped, but we’ll all fit. We could all go.”

As Cassian let go of her hand and started barking out orders to pack, gear up, grab everything that wasn’t nailed down, the soldiers began to move around them. Arro smirked at Nema before taking off with the rest of them. Of course he’d noticed. Nema didn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing her blush, and looked to Jyn instead. K-2SO was making her laugh. That was a first, Nema thought.

Cassian was still giving out orders when Nema approached Jyn. The other woman smiled at her now, a small smile but a smile nonetheless, and Nema wondered how many times that had happened in the short time that they had known each other.

“I’m not used to people sticking around when things go bad.” Jyn said it as an apology, an explanation, but Nema understood. This was probably the first time that Jyn had felt any kind of fellowship since she had left Saw Gerrera. And the Rebellion may be fractured and indecisive, but this mission was what the rebellion was about. Jyn was as self-evident a part of it as Nema was.

“Welcome home,” Nema replied, and she meant it.

 

-

 

The ship was cramped, just like Bodhi had said. Nema spent the first hour in hyperspace with Bodhi, K-2SO, and Jyn, watching the former two work the controls and bicker about the best way of approaching Scarif. In the cargo hold, Arro and the rest of the rebels were waiting. Nema tried not to think too much about what it was they were waiting for. She and Jyn didn’t speak much, but Jyn’s demeanor was entirely changed – her posture was more relaxed, and she laughed at one of Bodhi’s comments to K-2 without even stopping to check herself. This was her element. She knew how to do this, unlike Nema.

After that first scare with the call sign and getting off the planet had passed, Nema felt restless. She knew exactly why, but she felt foolish for doing it. They all needed to focus on the mission. The fact that they had all effectively defected from the Alliance seemed a bit more important than the fact that she wanted to hold Cassian’s hand again, but at the same time, those two facts occupied equal parts of her mind. She excused herself from her company, and Jyn shot her a knowing look before she descended the ladder. Of course Jyn knew. They all probably knew by now, but Nema couldn’t find it in her to care.

Cassian was sitting in the far end of the cargo hold, dismantling his blaster and checking for malfunctioning parts. She had to pass through the group of rebels to get to him, and she exchanged a few words with Yosh and Melshi about when they were going to arrive when she passed them. There wasn’t a single smile in the entire cabin before she got to Cassian, and she didn’t blame them. Arro put his hand on her shoulder when she passed, and she put hers on his. If she had had to pick out the people she would want to go into battle with the most, she would have chosen these.

“Hey,” Cassian said as she sat down next to him. He didn’t seem surprised to see her; he even smiled that small smile of his. “Did Bodhi have an estimate on our arrival?”

“Fifteen minutes.”

Cassian nodded and kept his eyes on the weapon, checking it again before picking up the next one. They were all stolen weapons, Nema figured – they were all criminals now.

She had been right, of course. The restlessness ceased as soon as she sat down next to Cassian, and just watching his hands as he continued to work on the blasters calmed her. What could possibly go wrong now? Sure, they were going headfirst into a cesspool of chaos, but Cassian’s hands were steady. They would make it. They would save the rebellion. This was their only chance, and they _had_ to make it.

“Cassian?”

He hummed in response, not looking at her. She didn’t know what possessed her to say it.

“You’ve meant everything to me. Do you know that?”

His hands stilled, and her heart raced. She didn’t know herself what it meant, but she hoped that she could at least convey some part of what she felt. Even if it was just ‘hey, we’re about to die, but you know I like you, right?’. He looked at her, searchingly, and she still couldn’t read him. Cassian didn’t have the chance to reply, though, and Nema was both grateful and painstakingly aware that she had made a mistake.

“Nema. Cassian. We’re coming in on Scarif,” Jyn said from the bottom of the ladder. “You two should get up here.”

Cassian put the weapons away as Nema got to her feet and followed Jyn. She didn’t need to look at him. At least he knew now as well, even if it meant that they could never go back to what they had been.

Nema climbed the ladder and tried to keep her breath even as her heart still raced. It was mostly because of what had just transpired between her and Cassian, but also because she could see Scarif now, stretching out wide and blue beneath them. They were approaching fast and Bodhi was on the comms. Jyn motioned for Nema to be quiet, and she stilled at the top of the ladder with Cassian having climbed up behind her.

“Transmitting clearance code now,” Bodhi said, and it was as if they all held their breaths for the response. Nema was not looking at Cassian – in fact, she had the intention of not looking at Cassian until it was absolutely necessary.

“Cargo shuttle SW-0608? You are cleared for entry.”

It turned out that it was necessary to look at Cassian as the weight lifted from her chest. He grinned at her and grabbed her shoulder. Nema heard K-2 acknowledging Bodhi’s success behind her, and felt a moment of relief over the fact that she had actually told Cassian. They were really going to land on Scarif, and their mission had inched closer to its goal. She smiled back at him, despite her stomach dropping when he kept eye contact for a second longer than necessary.

“I’ll tell the others”, Jyn said, also smiling, and crept past them and down the ladder. She gave Nema a knowing look before she disappeared down the hatch, but Cassian had already gone up to talk to Bodhi. They were approaching the shield gate. When they had gone through it, Scarif stretched out under them in all its white-beached glory. Nema had never seen a planet like it before, and while she wondered how water could be so _blue,_ Cassian talked to Bodhi about the Citadel – the large tower in the middle of the compound. That was where they had to go.

“You’ll come with us?” The plan already consisted of Arro and the other rebels wreaking havoc in the compound while another group sneaked into the archive with K-2SO, but the plan relied on there being enough uniforms to steal once they landed.

“If I can.” She felt him look at her but didn’t look back. She didn’t dare to. “I’m not very stealthy and you might need someone who knows how to use a wrench.”

She caught a glimpse of Cassian’s smirk at this as she turned to climb down the ladder. Bodhi threw her a look over his shoulder which she pointedly ignored.

 

-

 

Scarif seemed like a desert compared to the humid air on Yavin IV. But there was no time to admire the scenery as the ship was rapidly approached by an inspection crew. Nema was cramped next to Cassian in one of the cargo holds, with Jyn in front of her and the knowledge that every other rebel on the ship probably was as uncomfortable and tense as she. At least she had Cassian’s shoulder touching hers.

Heavy, determined steps pounding through the floor of the cargo bay, and Bodhi’s voice sounding nervous but steady. The next thing she knew, there was a series of thumps as the inspection crew was knocked unconscious by the other rebels.

There were three of them. While they stripped the bodies of their uniforms, Nema didn’t look at their faces. She had no doubt that the inspection crew would be killed as soon as Nema, Jyn and Cassian had secured the unscathed uniforms and left the shuttle, but some things she didn’t need to think about in detail. Instead, she tried to focus on the clothes – there were two officers and one deck technician. The smallest officer’s clothes were a close enough fit to her own size to actually pull this off.

Having lived on a rebel base for years, Nema was used to seeing other people’s bodies in various states of undress without giving it a second thought. It wasn’t until she was standing in her sweaty camisole and underwear that she realized that Cassian was standing in front of her wearing just as few items of clothing. He was fastening his shirt and Nema couldn’t stop looking at his hands. And what was underneath them.

 _Get a grip. You’re about to go on a suicide mission._ But she could feel the blush creeping to her face, and her only consolation was that Cassian also turned away hurriedly, clearing his throat. Nema looked at Jyn just as she rolled her eyes.

“If you two could just sort out whatever is going on here, I’ll be waiting by the hatch.”

She bundled her own uniform up and crawled out of the cramped compartment, presumably to get changed somewhere else. The silence in her absence was only interrupted by Nema’s own beating heart.

She had managed to put her pants on (they were a size too big for her) before Cassian said something. Cassian looked up from closing his sand-colored shirt to catch her studying him. He seemed to hesitate for a moment before standing up straight.

“You’ve meant everything to me, too.” Quietly. He was looking at her with his kind brown eyes, and for a moment her whole world swayed – as if she had been caught up in a gust of wind, twirling around her insides and settling around her heart.

“Your shirt is uneven.” It was the first thing she thought of to say that didn’t sound pathetic, and her hands were surprisingly steady as she reached out to fix his shirt. Of course, she had to undo the buttons to do that. She heard Cassian inhale sharply as her fingers lightly touched the fabric, and she didn’t need to look at him to feel his gaze on her. If she did, she feared she would explode from everything that was going on inside her.

And the next breathtaking moment, he brushed the back of his fingers against her cheek.

“Done”, she whispered, smoothing out the creases of the stolen shirt with her hand. She hadn’t meant for it to come out as a whisper, but she had never had any hopes of being casual in a situation like this. They were so close their noses were almost touching.

“We should go”, Cassian said, still looking into her eyes.

Nema kissed him. Softly, and if she had ever imagined what that would feel like, her daydreaming hadn’t come anywhere close. And Cassian’s hand moved from her face to her hair as he breathed into her, gently deepening the kiss. She was  _ home.  _ She hadn’t kissed anyone like this before, and she wasn’t sure if it was because they were about to do something incredibly dangerous or just because she had been waiting for this for so long. And because of all that, it felt dreamlike. The scratch of Cassian’s stubble on her cheek was close and unreal at the same time. The sensation of his body, suddenly pressed to hers, mixed with the sudden silence around her and she felt herself being pushed up against the cramped compartment wall, her hands suddenly in his hair as well –

They had a mission. They couldn’t get lost like this.

Cassian’s forehead rested against hers as the kiss broke, and he was looking at her as if he hadn’t really seen her before. “Hello.” His voice was still soft. If this was the last good thing to ever happen to her, it was more than enough.

“Hello.”

Cassian smiled and  glanced down at their stolen clothes. “ _ Now  _ we should really get ready.”

He loosened his grip of her, creating some distance between them even though she could tell that he didn’t want to, either. He met her eyes again and took a deep breath.

“Nema, if we don’t make it out…”

“Don’t, Cassian.” She couldn’t tell him that they would, but she wanted to stay in this moment. She just wanted to remember him like this. Dirty, sweaty, dead tired – just like her. And she hoped that he felt the same thing that she did, that gust of wind still making her unsure of what had just happened, but suddenly more at ease than she had been for days. She could do anything now.

She strained her smile, and trying to sound much more confident than she was, she said: “Come on. Let’s get dressed and save the rebellion.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a shitty year. I'm sorry. Depression took away most of my creativity before I could finish this chapter, but here it finally is.
> 
> I love you and all your amazing comments <3


	9. Chapter 9

The uniform was stifling in the sun. The air wasn’t like the air on the base – this was a dry, salty heat. Nema had tried to tame her hair into a quick braid under the officer’s cap, much like the one its previous owner had worn. She was far from certain that she had been successful. Beside her, Cassian looked striking but slightly panicked. The grayish green of the Imperial uniform looked good on him. Most Imperial officers Nema had come into contact with had worn their uniforms with fierceness, a kind of maliciousness that seeped into every pore of their body. Despite the coldness that Cassian sometimes displayed, he didn’t come close to that.

She couldn’t see Jyn’s face behind her visor. K-2 was the only one definitely blending in as they walked across the platform to the railway pod.

“I have a bad feeling about this”, the cynical droid uttered before the doors had even closed, and even though they all silenced him, Nema was sure that they all had that feeling. This was suicide. She had hugged Arro before they left, but there had been nothing of their usual banter. It had hit her hard then that one of them or even both were in danger of never coming back from this mission. She swallowed that feeling along with her tears as the pod moved towards the citadel.  
  
“We need a map”, Cassian said as they were approaching their stop.  
  
“Well, I’m sure there’s one just lying about”, K-2 retorted, and Cassian sighed.  
  
“You know what you have to do.”  
  
Even though Nema was sure that everyone noticed the sweat on her forehead, she realized that they really were blending in. No one paid them any attention after they stepped out of the pod, and Nema kept her back straight. Everything worked according to plan, until K-2SO managed to overpower another K-2X droid to extract information. They all kept watch and the whole thing was over quickly, but K-2’s voice was distraught as he relayed the information.  
  
“Our optimal route to the data vault places only eighty-nine stormtroopers in our path. We will make it no more than thirty-three percent of the way before we are killed.”  
  
Eighty-nine stormtroopers. Nema froze as K-2 dropped the now disabled droid to the floor, and Cassian called up Melshi on the comm.  
  
“Melshi, talk to me.” There was a slight pause when Cassian waited for a response. He met Nema’s eyes for a brief second before he continued. “Light it up.”  
  
No more than two minutes later, the whole area was swarming with stormtroopers marching out to fight the rebels. The four of them could walk in the other direction without suspicion, but as Nema was starting to relax there was a brusque voice from a short distance away.  
  
“You! Officer!”  
  
Nema tried to ignore it, but the man who had called caught up with her and grabbed her shoulder. She didn’t know much about Imperial grades, but the way the older man looked at her made her realize that he outranked her stolen uniform. In front of her, her three companions looked at her but tried to avoid suspicion themselves. If they stopped, they would risk getting caught. Nema knew that. But her heart sank as Cassian looked at her one last time before a group of stormtroopers shielded him from view.  
  
“Is something wrong?” the man asked her. He had a stern, suspicious face.  
  
“No, sir.” Nema hoped that she was the only one who could hear the slight stutter.  
  
“I need you to deliver this to command right away.” He handed her a small holodisc. Nema held her breath. Any second now he would realize that she didn’t belong there.  
  
“Right away, sir”, Nema echoed, and to her great surprise, the man nodded and turned his back to her. He started ordering troops around. She was left alone with the holodisc, and with no idea which way to go.  
  
The art of stealth is to look like you belong, Cassian had told her once. Don’t hesitate. They had been sitting at a lunch table on base after one of his missions. He had laughed when she had told him that she never had thought that there could be an art to sneaking around.  
  
How hard could it be? Nema picked a direction and walked, still keeping her back straight, and still hoping that no one around her could tell how much her hands were shaking. This was wrong. She wasn’t supposed to be alone. But now she couldn’t risk going back the same way, crossing paths with the commander again and exposing both herself and her team.  
  
She walked around aimlessly for a while, trying to maintain some kind of composure, but it was useless. She couldn’t very well ask which way to go, so her best shot was going back the way they had come. She had her blaster. If she could make her way back to the ship, she could help Bodhi and get them out of there. Lacking a better plan, it was the only thing she could do.  
  
It would only take one slip-up to get her killed. She knew that. So she took a deep breath, put the holodisc in her front pocket and assumed what she hoped was her most determined face. There was a smaller group of troopers entering the same kind of pod she had exited before, and she marched up to them with all the courage she could muster.  
  
“Sir”, one of the anonymous troopers greeted her. “I didn’t think there were any of you coming with us.”  
  
“You are wrongly informed, then”, Nema sneered. “I have been ordered to accompany you. To oversee things.” That bit she had learned from one particularly nasty commanding officer she had had herself, back on Dantooine. There was nothing more stressful than someone outranking you telling you that they were just there to watch.  
  
In the split second before the trooper shrugged and made room for her inside the pod, Nema swore she saw her whole life flash before her eyes.  
  
As the troopers discussed tactic she realized that she would have to shoot her way out to get to where she wanted, and that thought didn’t scare her as much as it should have. It was all about survival now. Her own, and the rebellion, and Cassian and Jyn.  
  
“You should stay behind us, sir, once the doors open”, the same trooper said as they approached their destination. Nema nodded. It was unnecessary to talk more, and she didn’t trust in her abilities now that she had had the time to think. She moved to the back of the line as the door slid open, at first only showing a small circular opening to the world outside.  
  
She was back at the shuttle pad. There wasn’t any fighting here, but from her place in the back she could see the smoke and hear the roaring of distant explosions. The troopers moved forward and she kept her hand on her blaster, knowing that the rebels tasked with guarding the shuttle were all around her, unseen. But the only person visible to the troopers was Bodhi, who crouched over a wire, fiddling with something to plug it in. He hadn’t seen them yet.  
  
“Hey you, identify yourself!” the trooper who had talked to Nema demanded, and Bodhi stood up. Nema gripped her blaster tighter. Breathe.  
  
“I can explain”, Bodhi began, but Nema raised her blaster, aimed, and shot the trooper in the back before they could hear Bodhi’s explanation. And there they were – the rebels hiding took out the trooper closest to her with another blaster shot, and he landed with a thud on the concrete. She met Bodhi’s eyes for a fraction of a second before they both dove to get away from the fire.  
  
“Incoming fire, take cover!” The troopers scattered. Nema and Bodhi huddled together behind a crate.  
  
“What happened?” Bodhi had to shout to be heard over the sound of the fight.  
  
“We got separated”, Nema shouted back. “What are you doing?”  
  
“We need to patch through to the comms tower to get a message to the fleet, to… to open the shield gate. We’re trapped down here, and they’re trapped in the citadel.”  
  
_They’re trapped. The fleet is here but Jyn and Cassian are trapped._ Nema blinked, tried to get the feeling of Cassian out of the way. “What do you need me to do?”  
  
Before Bodhi could reply, they heard Cassian’s voice from the comm. “Bodhi? Are you there? Have you got the switch?”  
  
“I can’t get to the shuttle. I can’t plug in!” Bodhi’s voice was frantic, and Nema put her hand on his shoulder as Cassian spoke again.  
  
“You have to! They have to hit that gate. If the shield's open, we can send the plans!”  
  
“Bodhi, I’ll cover you. You just need to run.”  
  
Bodhi looked like he hadn’t heard her at first, but then he opened the line to Cassian again. “Nema’s here, Cassian. She’ll cover me. We’ll do it.”  
  
If Cassian had any reaction to her being there, it wasn’t evident in his voice. “Good. Now go!”  
  
The communication ended. Shots were still flying above their heads, and Nema met Bodhi’s gaze. “For Jedha”, she said. And Bodhi nodded.  
  
“For Jedha.”  
  
She felt like she channeled everything Arro had ever taught her as she and Bodhi made their way across the platform. Bodhi ran, keeping his head down, as she aimed for anyone that might get in his way. She hit a stormtrooper in the middle of his chest plate, and another one in the head as they were aiming for Bodhi. To them, it looked like she was an enraged Imperial officer chasing a rebel. At least until she started shooting at them.  
  
She was as amazed as Bodhi was that they made it into the shuttle unscathed. Bodhi plugged the cable into the shuttle’s comm system while Nema kept watch, blaster still in hand.  
  
“Melshi”, Nema heard Bodhi say behind her. “Melshi, come in please. I'm tied in at my end, I just need an open line.”  
  
Nema heard Melshi reply –  _they’re still alive, they’re still fighting –_  but she couldn’t make out what he said. And then they waited for the connection to open without being able to do anything to help. Nema shot any stormtrooper who got too close, but she tried to retain her fire to avoid drawing attention to her and Bodhi.  
  
“They need to find the master switch”, Bodhi explained, still crouching by the system. “If they can just open the channel, we can send a message to the fleet.” She had already heard him explain it, but realized that he was repeating it to himself as much as he was saying it to her. Just to keep sane. To keep his own hopes up.  
  
“Yes!” he exclaimed after another anxious minute as the system beeped. “We’re online!” Nema kneeled next to him, trying to shield him. He patched through and sent the message.  
  
“This is Rogue One, calling any Alliance ships that can hear me.” There was no reply. Bodhi ripped off his goggles in frustration. “Is there anybody up there? This is Rogue One! Come in, over.”  
  
“This is Admiral Raddus, Rogue One, we hear you!”  
  
Nema couldn’t help but grin as Bodhi continued. “We have the plans!” Bodhi stumbled over his own words, but composed himself. ”They found the Death Star plans. They have to transmit them from the communications tower! You have to take down the shield gate. It's the only way to going to get them through.”  
  
There was a short pause, and then: “Standby, Rogue One, we're on it.”  
  
Nema knew that Bodhi’s quiet “this is for you, Galen” wasn’t meant for her to hear. She kept her eyes on the fight outside and raised her blaster just in time to shoot a stormtrooper as he raised his arm to throw a grenade. It clattered to the ground at his lifeless body.  
  
She didn’t have the time to say anything – she just threw herself on top of Bodhi, shielding him from the shockwave. She got the wind knocked out of her and for a moment, everything went quiet and dark. When she opened her eyes, gasping for air, Bodhi was looking at her with wide eyes. “We need to get out of here,” she said to him. “We’re still their only chance of getting out of here, and we’re sitting ducks.”  
  
Bodhi nodded. “I’ll get us in the air. Get as many of the others in here as you can.”  
  
Arro wasn’t among the rebels outside. Nema motioned to as many moving rebels as she could see to get to the ship, but she couldn’t see Arro. He was on the other team. She knew that, but she still waited a second before closing the hatch. She hoped that he was still out there, and that Chirrut and Baze and Melshi and Yosh and everyone else were still alive.  
  
She clung to that thought. She knew, deep down, that most of them were gone.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This will be a short one, but it needed to be that way. Leave a comment and make my day! (Unintentional rhyming.)

They watched as the Star Destroyer fell through the gate far above them, pulled by gravity and breaking the planetary shield. The sky was exploding. Jyn and Cassian would be able to send the files from the citadel.    
  
There was some part of Nema that was rejoicing, but she focused most of her attention on helping Bodhi pilot the ship away from the fight. This was a cargo vessel, not fully equipped for battle – and it was an Imperial ship, which meant that they were at risk of getting shot down by their own.    
  
There were hardly any rebel ships left, though. It wasn’t until Nema saw the gray shape of the Death Star on the horizon that she realized that there weren’t many ships left at all. She tried to focus, but suddenly felt dizzy.   
  
“Bodhi.” She made him look, and it took a few excruciating seconds for him to react. He didn’t say anything. He just met her gaze, eyes wide.   
  
They had circled the citadel looking for stranded rebels, but everything seemed to have stilled down there. The Imperial troops were evacuating, and the rebel ships were either gone or burning in the sand. Bodhi had tried to reach Cassian on his comlink, but there was just static.   
  
“We have to find them!” She had no idea what made her sound so sure that they had even survived. “They got out. They’re out here somewhere.”   
  
“Nema…”    
  
“ _ No _ !” Bodhi flinched at her tone. “Please”, she added, feeling her voice break, her chest aching. “We’ll just go around one more time. I have to know.”   
  
Bodhi, the man she hadn’t seen for years before this, couldn’t possibly know what Cassian meant to her. Still he nodded and did what she asked.   
  
Leaving the ship to Bodhi, Nema scanned the beach by the citadel for movement. Anything at all. If the planet killer was here it only meant one thing, and they had to find them before that happened. She was prepared to see the flash on the horizon at any second. 

 

What if they didn't find them? What if it was too late?    
  
Two small figures against the sand, kneeling on the beach just ahead of them.   
  
They had minutes, at most. Bodhi landed the shuttle in the ankle-deep water and Nema all but flung herself down the ladder, into the cargo hold, and through the hatch as it opened. Cassian was leaning heavily on Jyn. Tonc and Eskro, the only two that had managed to escape with the ship followed Nema out to help, but she was only partially aware of them as she put Cassian’s other arm over her shoulder.    
  
Tonc and Eskro took over as they came closer to the hatch, and Nema supported Jyn instead as she hobbled aboard. Tonc shouted to Bodhi to close the hatch, and the sunlight disappeared from the cargo hold.   
  
“Go to him”, Jyn said hoarsely. “I’m fine.”   
  
They put Cassian down on the floor. Stordan Tonc, one of the younger rebels, was checking him over as Nema kneeled next to them. Cassian was barely awake, but he recognized her. He reached for her and she took his hand.   
  
“Hey”, she said. “I’m here. We’re getting you out.”   
  
“You made it.” His voice was weak. “When we got separated, I thought…”   
  
“You taught me everything I know about deception. Don’t you remember?” She smiled, but Cassian groaned again as Tonc felt with his hands across Cassian’s ribs.   
  
“Tonc?”   
  
The rebel shook his head. “It’s bad. We need to get him to a bacta tank.”   
  
The shuttle was already in the air. She couldn’t sit here and wait for the planet killer to hit them. If she could, she would help get Cassian to safety. “Stay with him?” she asked Tonc, who nodded and pulled out his emergency bacta kit from one of the front pockets on his vest. Nema made her way up the ladder to Bodhi.   
  
She had just sat down in the co-pilot seat when the blinding light hit Scarif’s blue waters. It didn’t aim directly for the base, but after Jedha they both knew that that didn’t matter. Bodhi maneuvered the shuttle around, away from the wave.    
  
Nema had forgotten how to breathe.    
  
But this wasn’t Jedha – they were prepared, and they had a head start this time. She didn’t let out her breath until they left the atmosphere. The planetary shield was gone, but the area was still teeming with Imperial activity.   
  
_ If K-2 had been here, he could have… _ Nema didn’t finish that thought. She knew how to calculate the hyperdrive. She could do it without the annoying droid. K-2SO was gone. Arro was gone. Baze and Chirrut were gone. If Cassian didn’t make it –    
  
She blinked hard several times to be able to focus on the controls.   
  
Jyn climbed up the ladder just as they had made the jump. She was a mess, battered and bloody and bruised, but she put her hand over Nema’s shaking one. “I’ll stay up here if Bodhi needs help”, she said.    
  
Nema hesitated for a second before leaving. “Did you get the transmission out?”   
  
Jyn nodded. “We did.”   
  
-   
  
Cassian was fading in and out of consciousness. Tonc had done what he could, but an emergency bacta kit was far from enough. The rebels were scattered along the walls of the cargo hold and the whole ship was eerily silent. Their mission had been successful, but only a handful of them were returning.   
  
He was awake, just enough to know that she was there. He was in pain. Nema took his hand.   
  
“I’m here”, she whispered. His hand was cold, his breathing shallow.    
  
“I’m sorry, Nema – “ She shushed him, and moved from her uncomfortable position on the floor to lie down on her side next to him. Equally uncomfortable, but closer to Cassian. He was on his back, his neck supported by her discarded uniform jacket.   
  
“You have nothing to be sorry for.”   
  
“I didn’t want to leave you.” He tried to take a deep breath which turned into coughing, which turned into wincing in pain. Nema squeezed his hand and waited for him to settle again. “It took me too long to realize what you… what it meant that you –” He pressed his eyes shut for a moment. Another bout of pain. When he opened his eyes again, they were wide and scared. “I don’t want to leave you.”   
  
“You’re not going anywhere.” She sounded confident, but Cassian was slipping under. His eyes fluttered shut. “Cassian.” She could tell that he was fighting it, but he was losing. “Cassian, you’re not going anywhere. Come on.” She sat up again, kneeled beside him to gently shake his shoulders. “Please, Cassian…” Her voice was breaking again. There was so much she needed to tell him. So much she had put off, just waiting for the right moment – but she could see it so clearly now, the way their friendship had merged into what it was, and how stupid she had been to doubt her own significance in that.    
  
Tonc came up to them and crouched next to her, feeling for a pulse. But Nema already felt it, weakly against her fingers, the soft thud of it where it should have been strong. “Jyn said that he fell. He’s bleeding internally.”   
  
_ No.  _   
  
Nema wanted to scream. She wanted to hit Tonc, to punch her way out of this feeling – to do something that Jyn would have done. But she just stayed there, motionless, like Jyn on Jedha in front of her father’s hologram. Tonc left them, and Jyn herself climbed down the ladder and sat down on the other side of Cassian. Nema didn’t grasp any of that until Jyn spoke.   
  
“He saved me.” Nema looked up, but Jyn’s gaze was fixed on Cassian. ”I thought he was gone, but he saved me.”   
  
They stayed silent after that. Nema kept her hand on that pulse for the entire time they were in hyperspace, but by the end she wasn’t sure if it was still there or if it was just an echo against her fingers.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I accidentally made the last chapter a lot longer than I intended to, to for my own sanity's sake I had to split them up. Here's the first part. (I hope, unless the actual last chapter keeps on growing even more...)
> 
> Please leave a comment and/or kudos, it really makes my day!

They carried Cassian away on a stretcher. She jogged alongside it all the way to the infirmary, and it wasn’t until she was inside the brightly lit room that she realized that Jyn and Bodhi were right behind her. Cassian was put on an exam table, and the medical droids started their hurried examination.  
  
She couldn’t watch this. Cassian was lying there while the droids poked and prodded at him, and Nema’s body felt brittle. As if one push could shatter her whole being – as if the only reason she was still standing was the slow beating of Cassian’s heart on one of the monitors. She couldn’t watch this, but she couldn’t look away.   
  
“Sergeant Ress, you shouldn’t be in here. We will take care of him.” Medical droids were programmed to emit calmness and security in dire situations, and Nema’s knowledge of that didn’t make it easier.   
  
“But –”   
  
She felt Jyn’s hand on her arm, pulling her away, and the droid gave her a look that was programmed to be sympathetic. “Captain Andor will be submerged in a bacta tank until he has hopefully healed. He will be put in a medically induced coma. There is nothing more you can do for him, Sergeant.”   
  
_Hopefully._ The droid had to add _hopefully._  Jyn was still holding her arm, trying to pull her out, and Nema finally gave in.   
  
“Draven wants us”, Jyn said. “Come on. He’s in good hands.” She tried to sound comforting, but Nema could hear the tightness in her voice.   
  
She sat through the debrief in the briefing room with General Draven, Bodhi and Jyn on either side of her. She stayed silent until she had to give her account of the events on Scarif. So many others beside their own makeshift squad had perished, and the plans weren’t even in safe hands – Draven had just gotten word that Princess Organa’s ship had been intercepted. Nema didn’t want to, but she couldn’t help it – the thought that it may all have been for nothing still made its way into her mind.   
  
Apparently, she was the highest-ranking member of the Alliance that had escaped Scarif’s surface, so the task fell on her to report. She told it like it was, and tried to remember the details even though it felt like her mind was burning: how they had decided to take the Imperial shuttle, despite the risks; how they had stolen the uniforms, leaving out the part when she was alone with Cassian; how they had gotten separated in the citadel, and how she made it out; how they had gotten the message through to Admiral Raddus, before finding Jyn and Cassian on the beach. She handed Draven the holodisc which she had almost forgotten about. At least she had thought to stuff it in her pant pocket before she helped support Cassian’s head with the jacket.   
  
Draven watched her with solemn interest as she spoke, but she saw his interest pique at certain points. Apparently, fooling stormtroopers that you were their commanding officer wasn’t something every mechanic could do. (And in the relative safety of the base, even Nema thought that it sounded impressive.)   
  
Jyn’s report was concise and almost devoid of emotion. Nema could see it, though – the slight shift in the other woman’s voice when she talked about K-2SO, and about Cassian falling down the shaft. The fact that Cassian then had climbed all the way up to save Jyn from Director Krennic was nothing short of miraculous.   
  
When Jyn went silent, Draven’s brow was furrowed. “You all defied a direct order, not only from me, but by order of the council.” His voice was hard, but then again, he always sounded like that. Nema felt her insides churn, and she glanced at Bodhi and Jyn. Jyn’s jaw was clenched while Bodhi’s mouth was ajar.   
  
He couldn’t punish them, could he? Draven sighed and crossed his arms. “Despite this, this might be our most successful operation yet, regardless of the outcome. We just have to wait for further reports.” He must have picked up on their tension, because he raised an eyebrow. “And I’m not punishing you. You’ve been through enough and you’ve all proven yourself to be of great value to the Alliance.”   
  
“Has there been any news about Captain Andor?” Senator Mothma had been quiet until now, but her soft voice carried all the way from her position in the shadows.   
  
“He’s in a coma.” Nema was surprised at how thin her voice was. Running a hand over his eyes, Draven sighed.   
  
“Let’s hope this operation doesn’t claim another life.”

  
\- 

  
Nema tried to keep herself occupied for hours. She joined Bodhi as he got his security briefing and his Imperial pilot jumpsuit was exchanged for an almost new Alliance one. She showed Jyn where the canteen was, but although Jyn tried to get her to eat, Nema only managed a few bites and a mug of water. She talked to Thel and a few others from her old squad as they were cleaning their equipment, but none of them seemed to know what to say to her.  Scarif was already a legend on the base, and Nema didn't have the energy to explain to anyone else what they had gone through.   
  
The air smelled exactly like it had on that night when she had fallen asleep on Cassian’s shoulder. Her bed was the same as she had left it, and the image of Cassian smiling at her from the doorway hit her as she sat down on the blanket-covered mattress. It felt like a lifetime ago.   
  
They had given Jyn one of the bunks next to Nema’s. Jyn was already sleeping, her stolen Imperial jumpsuit lying in a heap on the floor next to her toppled-over boots. Bodhi was in one of the dorms down the hall. Nema wondered if he was awake, like her, trying to fathom everything that had happened. Jyn had seen her share of violence before this, but she doubted that Bodhi had. Neither of them had been heroes – just workers trying to survive on either side of the war. Bodhi’s transformation had come from defecting from the Empire. Nema wondered if her transformation had happened here, in this room, when Cassian had told her that she didn’t have to come. When she had realized that she couldn’t leave his side in this fight.   
  
She eventually caved to her aching body, and climbed under the blanket without bothering to remove her stolen shirt. 

  
\- 

  
The holodisc she had carried with her all the way from Scarif turned out to contain important Imperial intel. That was one of many reasons General Draven had for reassigning Nema to the Intelligence branch.   
  
“We have mechanics, but we need Intelligence officers”, he said to her and Jyn after bringing them to the briefing room once again. They didn’t argue. Jyn was desperate to get out there, and Nema was surprised to feel the same way. She wasn’t sure if it was because of some newfound passion for the cause, or if she just needed to get her mind off of Cassian. She settled for it being a combination of the two.   
  
Cassian was still in a coma when Princess Organa arrived with the Death Star plans, hidden in the circuits of an R2 unit. Bodhi hugged Nema when the news came, and that tightly coiled knot in Nema’s chest loosened a little – Scarif hadn’t been for nothing. They followed the events from the control room as Luke Skywalker made that last shot, the one that would destroy the Death Star and make Galen Erso’s hidden fault the biggest victory for the rebellion to date. Jyn wouldn’t show that she was crying, but Nema took her hand anyway.   
  
It was hard watching the princess reunite with Luke and that pilot, Solo, after the fight. Nema was glad that she wouldn't stay for the celebration. As the whole base seemed to erupt in cheering and drinking, Nema, Jyn and Bodhi packed up their U-wing and got ready to fly out on their first mission after Scarif. The war wasn’t over just because the Death Star was gone.   
  
Nema was bending over, packing up the last of their food supplies when she looked up to see the princess standing by the U-wing's hatch. She was quiet, all wide eyes and hair buns that had started to come loose, and Jyn and Bodhi were off getting more supplies.   
  
“Hello”, was all Nema could think of to say. The princess smiled. Nema remembered Alderaan, and wondered how someone who had lost everything could seem so collected.   
  
“You’re one of the rebels from Scarif, aren't you?”   
  
“I am.” Nema closed up the last of the food containers and stood up straight. “And you’re Leia Organa."   
  
The princess nodded, and then seemed to hesitate. “I just wanted to say… That was really brave, what you did. Running off. You and your crew saved the rebellion.”   
  
Nema huffed and moved to calibrate the comm unit to match the newest Alliance encryption codes. “So did you. I can’t imagine being Vader’s prisoner.”   
  
Leia was quiet for a moment, and Nema half expected her to have walked away when she looked up again. But the princess was still standing there, looking at Nema intently.   
  
“I hope your captain gets better soon”, she said, and Nema wondered who she had talked to, because the softness of her voice was not only about an Intelligence officer whose captain was in a coma. She wondered if the princess also knew that Nema hadn’t gone to see Cassian once since they brought him to the infirmary. ”The Alliance will never forget what you did.”   
  
”Was it worth it, though?” Nema couldn’t stop herself. The princess was already moving away, and Nema shouldn’t keep her from celebrating, but the words stumbled out of her mouth before she could think. The princess paused in her movement and turned to Nema again. Nema swallowed. Her throat was dry. ”All those lives, just… lost. What if we could have saved them? What if I could have saved them?”   
  
Arro’s smiling face fought to make it into her mind’s eye. Nema hadn’t cried in a long time, and she refused to do so now. The princess was still watching her. Nema felt a pang of guilt. She shouldn’t be imposing her selfish doubts on anyone, let alone another war hero who had just saved the day. But the princess who had lost her entire planet stepped into the shuttle and put her hand on Nema's shoulder.   
  
”You did all you could. Sometimes…” Leia sighed, squeezed Nema’s shoulder a little harder. ”Sometimes war is just war. You’ve given so much to this rebellion already. It would be a shame if it were to take away your belief in yourself as well.”   
  
Nema shook her head, trying to rid it of the fog that had started to form in her eyes. ”I know”, she said, and although her voice was low she was surprised at how true that statement was. ”I just miss them so much."   
  
Her voice cracked. It was too late now - the princess had managed to bring out what even Bodhi had failed to. And she allowed herself to cry, even if only for a minute, while the princess who had lost everything held her, stroking her hair and telling her that it was fine, _just let it out, you need to cry._ She allowed herself to see them: the little girl on Jedha, Galen, Chirrut, Baze, Arro, K-2SO, Melshi… The faces of those she hadn’t known for long and would never know exactly how they died, and those who had been the most important ones and who still had slipped away from her.

This awful, harrowing war. And she was in its grasp now, giving her life to it, and she chose to do so.  
  
It wasn't very dignified, any of it, but maybe it didn't have to be. When her sobs subsided and Leia let go of her, Nema could see the tears that hadn’t fallen from her eyes.   
  
”We all need time to grieve”, Leia said, wiping her eyes but smiling kindly at Nema. ”My father used to say that there is a time after battle when you must allow yourself to grieve, or else you’re always in danger of being consumed by the fight itself.”   
  
Nema dried her wet cheeks with the sleeve of her jacket. ”I’m sorry about your parents”, she said weakly. ”I’m sorry about your planet.”   
  
She patted Nema’s hand, her kind smile turning sad. “The galaxy will see more loss before this war is over.”   
  
Leia had left when Jyn and Bodhi came back to the ship, both of them seemingly relieved to be leaving the party. If they could tell that she had been crying, they didn’t say anything. They all dealt with their memories in different ways.


End file.
